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MEDIiEVAL AND MODERN 
HISTORY 



BY 



PHILIP VAN NESS MYERS 

Author of "A History of Greece," " Rome : Its Rise and Fall, 
"Ancient History," and "A General History" 



REVISED TO INCLUDE 
THE WORLD WAR, 1914-1918 



GINN AND COMPANY 

BOSTON • NEW YORK • CHICAGO • LONDON 
ATLANTA • DALLAS • COLUMBUS • SAN FRANCISCO 



^ 






"Entered at Stationers' Hall 



Copyright, 1S85, 1905, 1919, by 
PHILIP VAN NESS MYERS 



ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



GINN AND COMPANY • PRO- 
PRIETORS • BOSTON • U.S.A. 



apg 2i i9f9 




The real history of the human race is the history of tendencies 
which are perceived by the mind, and not of events which are dis- 
covered by the senses. — Buckle. 

Historical facts should not be a burden to the memory but an 
illumination of the soul, — Lord Acton. 

But history ought surely in some degree, if it is worth anything, 
to anticipate the lessons of time. We shall all no doubt be wise 
after the event ; we study history that we may be wise before the 
event. — Seeley. 



Ill 



PREFACE 

The revised text of my Medieval and Modei'n History has 
already appeared in a two-volume edition under the titles of 
The Middle Ages and The Modern Age. It is here presented, 
somewhat abridged, in a single illustrated book designed as a 
companion volume to my revised Ancient History. 

The lists of books for further reading and study appended to 
the different chapters are in the main a selection from the fuller 
bibhographies of the earlier revised edition. The series of maps 
includes all the more important ones of that impression, besides 
fifteen new colored maps, eleven of which have been engraved 
expressly for the present work. The two entitled respectively 
"The Danelaw" and "Angevin Dominions" are taken by kind 
permission from Professor Edward P. Cheyney's A Short History 
of England, while "Europe after 1815 " and "Europe at the 
Present Time " are through like courtesy drawn from Professor 
James Harvey Robinson's An Introduction to the History of 
Western Europe. 

Since this volume, as already indicated, is practically only a 
slightly compressed edition of my Middle Ages and The Modern 
Age, it is fitting that I should here renew my expressions of grati- 
tude to Professor George Lincoln Burr of Cornell University, 
Professor H. Morse Stephens of the University of California, and 
Professor George M. Dutcher of Wesleyan University, Middle- 
town, Connecticut, for their scholarly and valuable assistance in 
the revision of the proofs of those texts. 

V 



vi PREFACE 

I would further make grateful mention of my indebtedness to 
my friend, Mr. Dudley Emerson, for the kindly loan of photo- 
graphs from his choice collection, and to my former pupil and 
assistant, Miss Mary Louise De Luce, for aid generously given me 

in the press of proof reading. 

P. V. N. M. 

College Hill, Ohio 
February, 1905 



CONTENTS 



Pagb 

List of Illustrations xii 

List of Plates xv 

List of Maps xv 

Chapter 

I. General Introduction : the Chief Factors in European Civili- 
zation I 



PART I — THE MIDDLE AGES 
FIRST PERIOD — THE DARK AGES 

(From the Fall of Rome to the Eleventh Century) 

JI. The Barbarian Kingdoms 7 

jtll. The Church and its Institutions 14 

I. The Conversion of the Barbarians 14 

II. The Rise of Monasticism 22 

III. The Rise of the Papacy . 27 

ly. The Fusion of Latin and Teuton 34 

y^ The Roman Empire in the East 42 

VI. The Rise of Islam 46 

VII. Charlemagne and the Restoration of the Empire in the West 61 

VIII. The Northmen : the Coming of the Vikings 71 

SECOND PERIOD — THE AGE OF REVIVAL 

(From the Opening of the Eleventh Century to the Discovery of 
America by Columbus in 1492) 

IX. Feudalism and Chivalry 77 

I. Feudalism 77 

II. Chivalry = . 93 

vii 



viii CONTENTS 

Chapter Page' 

X. The Normans i.oi 

I. The Normans at Home and in Italy loi 

II. The Norman Conquest of England 103 

XI. The Papacy and the Empire 1 11 

XII. The Crusades (1096-1273) 121 

I. Preparation of Europe for the Crusades .... 121 

II. The First Crusade (1096-1099) ....... 131 

III. The Second Crusade (11 47-1 149) - ^33 

IV. The Third Crusade (II 89-1 192) 135 

V. The Fourth Crusade (1202-1204) 136 

VI. The Children's Crusades ; Minor Crusades . . . 138 
VII. Crusades in Europe 141 

VIII. Influence upon European Civilization of the Cru- 
sades « 143 

XIII. Supremacy of the Papacy; Decline of its Temporal Power 148 

XIV. The Mongols and the Ottoman Turks . 159 

I. The Mongols 159 

II. The Ottoman Turks 164 

XV. The Growth of the Towns 169 

XVI. The Universities and the Schoolmen 187 

XVII. Growth of the Nations : Formation of National Govern- 
ments and Literatures 198 

I. England 199 

II. France . . ■ 220 

III. Spain 229 

IV. Germany 233 

V. Russia 242 

VI. Italy 244 

VII. The Northern Countries ' . . 249 

XVIII. The Renaissance 251 

I. The Beginnings of the Renaissance 251 

II. The Renaissance in Italy 255 

III. General Effects of the Renaissance 269 



CONTENTS IX 

PART II — THE MODERN AGE 
THIRD PERIOD — THE ERA OF THE REFORMATION 

(From the Discovery of America, in 1492, to the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648) 

Chapter Page 

XIX. Geographical Discoveries and the Beginnings of Modem 

Colonization 275 

XX. The Beginnings of the Reformation 292 

XXI. The Ascendancy of Spain ; her Relation to the Catholic 

Reaction 318 

I. Reign of the Emperor Charles V (1519-1556) . . 318 

II. Spain under Philip II (i 556-1598) ...... 326 

XXII. The Tudors and the English Reformation (i 485-1 603) . . 334 

I. Introductory 334 

II. The Reign of Henry VII (148 5-1 509) 335 

III. England severed from the Papacy by Henry VIII 

(1509-1547) 337 

IV. Changes in Creed and Ritual under Edward VI 

(1547-1553) •. 347 

y. Reaction under Mary (i 553-1 558) 349 

VI. Final Establishment of Protestantism under Eliza- 
beth (1558-1603) 351 

XXIII. The Revolt of the Netherlands : Rise of the Dutch Republic 

(1572-1609) • 363 

XXIV. The Huguenot Wars in France (i 562-1629) 376 

XXV. The Thirty Years' War (1 61 8-1 648) 387 



FOURTH PERIOD — THE ERA OF THE POLITICAL 
REVOLUTION 

(From the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648, to the Twentieth Century) 

L THE AGE OF ABSOLUTE MONARCHY : THE PRELUDE 
TO THE POLITICAL REVOLUTION (1648-1789) 

XXVI. Introductory : the Doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings 

and the Maxims of the Enlightened Despots .... 396 
XXVII. The Ascendancy of France under Louis XIV (1643-1715) 403 



X CONTENTS 

Chapter Pagb 

XXVIII. The Stuarts and the English Revolution (1603-1689) . 420 

I. The First Two Stuarts 420 

II. The Commonwealth and the Protectorate (1649- 

1660) 434 

III. The Restored Stuarts 443 

IV. Reign of William and Mary (i 689-1 702) . . . 450 

XXIX. The Rise of Russia. Peter the Great (1682-1725) . . 454 

XXX. The Rise of Prussia: Frederick the Great (i 740-1 786) . 469 

XXXI. England in the Eighteenth Century 480 

I. The Reign of Queen Anne (1702-17 14) . . . 480 

II. England under the Earlier Hanoverians . . . 484 

XXXII. Austria under the Benevolent Despot, Emperor Joseph II 

(1780-1790) 497 



11. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND THE NAPOLEONIC 
ERA (1789-1815) 

XXXIII. The French Revolution (i 789-1 799) ....... 500 

I. Causes of the Revolution ; the States-General 

of 1789 500 

II. The National or Constituent Assembly (June 17, 

1789-Sept. 30, 1791) 513 

III. The Legislative Assembly (Oct. i, 1791-Sept. 

19. 1792) 519 

IV. The National Convention (Sept. 20, 1792-Oct. 26, 

1795) 523 

V. The Directory (Oct. 27^ 1795-Nov. 9, 1799) . . 536 

XXXIV. The Consulate and the Napoleonic Empire (1799-18 15) 543 

I. The Consulate (i 799-1 804) 543 

II. The Napoleonic Empire (1804-18 15) ; the War of 

Liberation 551 



IIL THE RESTORATION OF 181 5 AND THE DEMOCRATIC 

REACTION : THE SEQUEL TO THE REVOLUTION 

(181 5-1904) 

XXXV. The Congress of Vienna and Mettemich 580 

XXXVI. France since the Second Restoration (1815-1905^ . . . 589 



CONTENTS xi 

Chapter Page 

XXXVII. England since the Battle of Waterloo (i8i 5-1905) . . 599 

I. Progress towards Democracy 600 

II. Extension of the Principle of Religious Equality 605 

III. England's Relations with Ireland 609 

XXXVIII. Spain and the Revolt of her American Colonies . . . 614 

XXXIX. The Liberation and Unification of Italy 619 

XL. The Making of the New German Empire 634 

XLL Austria-Hungary after 1866 . 650 

XLII. Russia since the French Revolution 654 

XLIII. European Expansion in the Nineteenth Century . . . 664 
I. Causes and General Phases of the Expansion 

Movement 664 

II. The Expansion of England 669 

III. The Expansion of France 678 

IV. The Expansion of Germany 680 

V. The Expansion of Russia 682 

VI. The Expansion of the United States .... 685 
VII. Situations and Problems created by the European 

Race Expansion .......... 687 

XLIV. The World State : .... 697 

Conclusion — The New Age: Industrial Democracy . . . 705 

General Bibliography 709 

Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 725 

Supplementary Chapter— The World War (1914-1918) . . . i 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Fig. Page 

1. Tomb of Theodoric at Ravenna 8 

2. St. Martin's Church, Canterbury 1 6 

3. The Ruins of lona 17 

4. The Ruins of Whitby 18 

5. The Ruins of the Church of St. Simeon Stylites, near Antioch, 

Syria 24 

6. The Simopetra Monastery of Mount Athos 25 

7. A Monk Copyist 26 

8. Trial by Combat 38 

9. Wager of Battle between a Man and Woman 39 

10. The Kaaba at Mecca 47 

11. The Mosque of Cordova 58 

12. A Viking Ship .' 72 

13. The Ceremony of Homage 82 

14. Typical Mediaeval Castle 88 

15. Group in the Manor House 92 

16. Arming a Knight 95 

17. A Tilting Match between Two Knights 96 

18. Degradation of a Knight 97 

19. Landing in England of William of Normandy loi 

20. Battle of Hastings 104 

21. Domesday Book 107 

22. The Spiritual and the Temporal Power 112 

23. Investiture of a Bishop by a King 116 

24. Reception of Crusaders by the King of Hungary 128 

25. The Horses of St. Mark's 137 

26. A Mediaeval Windmill 144 

27. Hut- Wagon of the Mediaeval Tartars 160 

28. The Taj Mahal at Agra 163 

29. Ruins of the Great Mosque at Samarkand . 168 

30. The Amphitheater at Aries in Mediaeval Times 170 

31. A Count and his Wife granting a Charter to a City 171 

32. State Barge of Venice used in the Ceremony of " Wedding the 

Adriatic " 180 

23. A Canal in Venice 181 

xii 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xiii 



Fig. 



Page 



34. The Cologne Cathedral 184 

35. Town Hall of Louvain 185 

36. University Audience in the Fifteenth Century 190 

37. The Murder of Thomas Becket 201 

38.. Carnarvon Castle 205 

39. Coronation Chair in Westminster Abbey 207 

40. Charge of French Knights and Flight of English Arrows . . 213 

41. Joan of Arc 214 

42. Plowing Scene 218 

43. In the Land of the Troubadours — the Castle of Foix .... 228 

44. Recumbent Effigy of Queen Isabella 232 

45. The Electors' Seat 236 

46. Savonarola 248 

47. Dante 253 

48. Petrarch 257 

49. A Block-Printed Page from the " Biblia Pauperum " . . . . . 263 

50. The Printing of Books 264 

51. Case of Chained Books 265 

52. Tomb at Tours of the Children of Charles VIII 267 

53. A Chinese Magnet Figure 277 

54. Christopher Columbus , • • 279 

55. "The Antipodes in Derision " 284 

56. Erasmus 296 

57. Martin Luther 3^2 

58. John Calvin 3^9 

59. Ignatius of Loyola 3^2 

60. Emperor Charles V . 3^8 

61. Philip II 326 

62. Henry VIII • •- • • 339 

63. Sir Thomas More 346 

64. Queen Elizabeth 352 

65. Mary Queen of Scots 355 

66. Mary Stuart as Queen of France 355 

67. Spanish and English War Vessels of the Sixteenth Century . . 358 

68. Melrose Abbey 362 

69. Typical Dutch Scene 3^3 

70. William of Orange (The Silent) . 3^7 

71. Coat of Arms of William, Prince of Orange ....... 375 

72. Henry IV, King of France 381 

73. Cardinal Richelieu 384 

74. Gustavus Adolphus . . . ' « 389 

75. Louis XIV 405 

76. Duke of Marlborough 4^2 



xiv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Fig. Page 

77. View of Versailles 416 

78. Charles I 426 

79. Execution of the Earl of Strafford 429 

80. Westminster Hall 433 

81. Oliver Cromwell 438 

82. Charles II 445 

83. Peter the Great . 456 

84. Catherine II of Russia 466 

85. Frederick the Great of Prussia 475 

86. John Wesley 488 

87. William Pitt, Earl of Chatham 489 

88. Voltaire 506 

89. Mirabeau 513 

90. The Lion of Lucerne 521 

91. The Guillotine 528 

92. Robespierre 532 

93. Napoleon Bonaparte 543 

94. William Pitt, Son of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham .... 555 

95. Baron vom Stein 572 

96. The Kremlin of Moscow 574 

97. Prince Metternich 585 

98. Napoleon III 593 

99. Queen Victoria as a Young Woman 599 

100. Lord Beaconsfield (Disraeli) 608 

loi. William Ew'art Gladstone 611 

102. Victor Emmanuel II 624 

103. Count Cavour 625 

104. Garibaldi 628 

105. Pope Pius X 631 

106. An Incident of the Franco-Prussian War: General Lapasset 

burning his Flags 645 

107. The Parliament Building at Budapest 651 

108. Henry M. Stanley 667 

109. The Imperial Regalia of Japan 688 

no. Field Marshal Oyama 694 

III. The Christ of the Andes 702 



LIST OF PLATES 

Facing 
Plate Page 

1. The Field of the Cloth of Gold. (From the painting in the 
Royal Collection at Hampton Court Palace) Frontispiece 

II. St. Mark's Square, Venice. (From a photograph) .... 148 

III. View of Florence, Italy, about the Year 1490. (From a con- 

temporary woodcut) 182 

IV. Milan Cathedral. (From a photograph) 186 

V. Canterbury Cathedral. (From a photograph) 200 

VI. Ruins of Fountains Abbey, Yorkshire, England. (From a 

photograph) 3Af4 

VII. Section of Old London Bridge. (From a contemporary 

drawing) 444 



LIST OF MAPS 



COLORED MAPS 

Based in the main on Kiepert, Schrader, Droysen, Spruner-Sieglin, Poole, and 
Freeman. Many of the maps have been so modified by additions and omissions that 
as they here appear they are practically new charts. Facing 

Page 

1. Europe in the Reign of Theodoric, about a.d. 500 8 

2. Greatest Extent of the Saracen Dominions, about a.d. 750 . . 52 

3. Europe in the time of Charles the Great, a.d. 814 . « . . . 64 

4. The Western Empire as divided at Verdun, a.d. 843 .... 68 

5. The Danelaw 74 

6. Hitchin Manor, England, about 1 816 . « , 84 

XV 



xvi LIST OF MAPS 

Facing 
Page 

7. Europe and the Orient in 1096 132 

8. Lands of the Holy Roman Empire under the Franconian 

Emperors, 1024-1125 152 

9. Angevin Dominions 202 

10. France about 1180 220 

11. Spanish Kingdoms in 1360 230 

12. Globe de Martin Behaim, 1492, and Globe Dore vers 1528 . , 280 

13. Explorations and Colonies of the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Sev- 

enteenth Centuries 286 

14. Europe at the Accession of the Emperor Charles V, 151 9 . . 320 

15. Europe after the Peace of Westphalia, 1648 392 

16. Central Europe in 1660 406 

17. The Baltic Lands, about 1701 . . . .' 458 

18. The Partition of Poland 466 

19. Prussia under Frederick the Great, 1740-1786 472 

20. Central Europe in 1780 ^ . . . 498 

21. Central Europe in 1801 546 

22. Central Europe in 1810 568 

23. Europe after 1S15 582 

24. Italy in 1859 626 

25. Europe at the Present Time 646 

26. Distribution of Races in Austria-Hungary 652 

27. Southeastern Europe in 1914 . 658 

28. The Partition of Africa 668 

29. European Expansion 678 

30. The Far East 688 



SKETCH MAPS 

Page 

1. Italy under the Lombards 11 

2. The Roman Empire under Justinian 43 

3. Discoveries of the Northmen jt, 

4. The Mongol Empire under Jenghis Khan and his Immediate 

Successors (thirteenth century) 161 

5. The Empire of the Ottoman Turks about 1464 167 

6. The Hansa Towns and their Chief Foreign Settlements . . . 174 

7. Russia and the Scandinavian Countries at the Close of the Middle 

Ages 243 

8. Italy about the Middle of the Fifteenth Century 246 

9. The Netherlands at the Truce of 1609 -,73 



MEDIEVAL AND MODERN 
HISTORY 

CHAPTER I 

GENERAL INTRODUCTION: THE CHIEF FACTORS IN 
EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION 

1. Preliminary Survey. — In an earlier volume we sketched 
briefly the affairs of men from the time that they first emerged 
from the obscurity of the past to the break-up of the Roman 
Empire in the West.-^ In the present work we propose to con- 
tinue the narrative there begun, and bring the story down to our 
own day. 

The fourteen centuries of history embraced in our survey are 
usually conceived as forming two periods, — the Middle Ages, or 
the period lying between the fall of Rome and the discovery of 
America by Columbus in 1492, and the Modern Age, which 
extends from the latter event to the present time. The Middle 
Ages again naturally subdivide into two periods, — the Dark Ages 
and the Age of Revival ; while the Modern Age, as we shall view 
it, also falls into two divisions, — the ^^^ of the Protestant 
Reformation and the Era of the Political Revolution. 

2. Chief Characteristics of the Four Periods. — The Dark Ages, 
which embrace the years between the fall of Rome and the 
opening of the eleventh century, are so called for the reason that 
the inrush of the barbarians and the almost total eclipse of the 

1 Our Ancient History practically ends with this great revolution of the fifth 
century of the Christian era, although in order to meet the requirements of some 
schools there is given in concluding chapters a brief resume of events down to the 
Restoration of the Empire by Charlemagne, a.d. 800. 

I 



2 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 

light of classical culture caused them to contrast unfavorably, in 
enlightenment and social order, as well with the age which pre- 
ceded as with that which followed them. The period was one of 
origins, — of the beginnings of peoples, and languages, and insti- 
tutions. During this time the Holy Roman Empire and the 
Papacy, institutions embodying two of the great ideals of the 
mediaeval ages, grew into shape and form. 

The Age of Revival begins with the opening of the eleventh 
century and ends with the discovery of the New World. During 
all this time civilization was making slow but sure advances; 
social order was gradually triumphing over feudal anarchy, and 
governments w^ere becoming more regular. The last part of 
the period especially was marked by a great intellectual revival, 

— a movement known as the Renaissance, or "New Birth," 

— by improvements, inventions, and discoveries which greatly 
stirred men's minds and awakened them as from a sleep. The 
Crusades, or Holy Wars, were the most remarkable undertakings 
of the age. 

The Era of the Reforniation embraces the sixteenth century 
and the first half of the seventeenth. The period is characterized 
by the great religious movement known as the Reformation, and 
the tremendous struggle between Catholicism and Protestantism. 
Almost all the wars of the period were religious wars. The last 
great combat was the Thirty Years' War in Germany, which was 
closed by the celebrated Peace of Westphalia, in 1648. After 
this date the disputes and wars between parties and nations were 
dynastic or political rather than religious in character. 

The Era of the Political Revolution extends from the Peace of 
Westphalia to the present time. The age is especially character- 
ized by the great conflict between despotic and liberal principles 
of government, resulting in the triumph of democratic ideas. 
During this period, in all the countries of Europe save Turkey and 
Russia, government by the people has taken the place of govern- 
ment by one or the few. This is one of the most important revo- 
lutions that history records. The central event of the epoch was 
the terrible upheaval of the French Revolution. 



SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FALL OF ROME 3 

Having now made a general survey of the region we are to 
traverse, and having marked the three successive stages of the 
progressive course of European civilization, the intellectual, the 
religious, and the political revolution, we must turn back to our 
starting point, the fall of Rome. 

3. Relation to World History of the Fall of Rome The calam- 
ity which in the fifth century befell the Roman Empire in the 
West is sometimes spoken of as an event marking the extinction 
of ancient civilization. The treasures of the Old World are 
represented as having been destroyed, and mankind as obhged 
to take a fresh start, — to lay the foundations of civihzation anew. 
It was not so. All or almost all that was really valuable in the 
accumulations of antiquity escaped harm, and became sooner or 
later the possession of the succeeding ages. The catastrophe 
simply prepared the way for the shifting in the West of the scene 
of civilization from the south to the north of Europe, simply 
transferred at once political power, and gradually social and 
intellectual preeminence, from one race to another, — from the 
Roman to the Teuton. 

The event was not an unrelieved calamity, because fortunately 
the floods that seemed to be sweeping so much away were not the 
mountain torrent, which covers fruitful fields with worthless drift, 
but the overflowing Nile with its rich deposits. Over all the regions 
covered by the barbarian inundation a new stratum of population 
was thrown down, a new soil formed that was capable of nourish- 
ing a better civilization than any the world had yet seen. Or, to 
use the figure of Draper, we may liken the precipitation of the 
northern barbarians upon the expiring Roman Empire to the heap- 
ing of fresh fuel upon a dying fire ; for a time it burns lower, and 
seems almost extinguished, but soon it bursts through the added 
fuel, and flames up with redoubled energy and ardor. 

4. The Three Chief Elements of European Civilization. — We 
must now notice what survived the catastrophe of the fifth 
century, what it was that Rome transmitted to the new Teu- 
tonic race. This renders necessary an analysis of the elements of 
civilization. 



4 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 

European civilization is mainly the result of the blending of 
three historic elements, — the Classical^ the Hebrew^ and the 
Teutonic. 

By the classical element in civilization is meant that whole 
body of arts, sciences, literatures, laws, manners, ideas, social 
arrangements, and models of imperial and municipal government 
— everything, in a word, save Christianity — that Greece and 
Rome gave to mediaeval and modem Europe. Taken together, 
these things constituted a valuable gift to the new northern race 
that was henceforth to represent civilization. It is true that the 
barbarian invaders of the Empire seemed at first utterly indifferent 
to these things ; that the masterpieces of antique art were buried 
beneath the rubbish of sacked villas and cities ; and that the precious 
manuscripts of the old sages and poets, because they were pagan 
productions and hence regarded as dangerous to Christian faith, 
were often suffered to lie neglected in the libraries of cathedrals 
and convents. Nevertheless, classical antiquity, as we shall learn, 
was the instructor of the Middle Ages. 

By the Hebrew element in history is meant Christianity. This 
has been a most potent factor in modem civilization. It has so 
colored the life and so molded the institutions of the European 
peoples that their history is very largely a story of this religion, 
which, first going forth from Judea, was given to the younger 
world by the missionaries of Rome. Among the doctrines taught 
by the new religion were the unity of God, the brotherhood of 
man, and immortality, -^ doctrines which have greatly helped to 
make the modern so different from the ancient world. 

By the Teutonic element in history is meant the barbarian 
peoples of Indo-European speech, the Goths, Franks, Danes, 
Angles, Saxons, and kindred tribes, who at the time of the break- 
up of the Roman Empire dwelt in central and northwestern 
Europe or had pushed into the Roman provinces and taken part 
in the overthrow of the Imperial Roman government. These folk 
had no arts or sciences or philosophies or literatures, but they 
and their later kin were destined to play a great part in the history 
of mediaeval arid modern times, 



CELTS, SLAVS, AND OTHER PEOPLES 5 

5. The Relative Importance in European History of the Clas- 
sical, the Christian, and the Teutonic Element. — The question as 
to the influence which each of these great historical factors has 
exercised upon the development of European civilization is a 
very important one for the historical student, for the reason that 
his whole conception of history will be colored by the answer he 
gives to it. Gibbon, for instance, exalted the classical element 
and depreciated Christianity, representing this religion rather as a 
retarding than as a helpful force in the hfe of the European peo- 
ples. This misconception of the real place in history that Chris- 
tianity actually holds is a chief fault of Gibbon's great work. The 
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 

On the other hand, some Church historians so represent his- 
tory as to give Christianity credit for almost all the progress 
made by the European peoples since the advent of Christ. This 
is to undervalue the other historical factors. 

Still others, again, represent the Teutonic race element as the 
chief force in modern civilization, and rest their hopes for the 
future of the world largely upon the Anglo-Saxon spirit of enter- 
prise, freedom, and progress. 

It is certain that we should allow the exclusive claims of none 
of these schools of interpreters of history. Modern civilization, 
as we have already intimated, is a very composite product. It 
has resulted from the mixing and mutual action and reaction 
upon one another of all the historical elements and agencies that 
we have mentioned — and many minor • ones besides. Civiliza- 
tion cannot spare the treasures of Greek and Roman antiquity; 
it cannot spare the religious doctrines and moral precepts of the 
great Hebrew teachers ; it cannot spare the earnest and master- 
ful spirit of the Teutonic race. If any one of these elements 
were taken from modern civilization, it would be something 
wholly different from what it is. 

6. Celts, Slavs, and Other Peoples. — Having noticed the 
Romans and the Teutons, the two most important of the peoples 
that present themselves to us at the time of the fall of Rome, if 
we now name the Celts, the Slavs, the Persians, the Arabians, and 



6 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 

the Mongols and Turks, we shall have under view the chief actors 
in the drama of mediaeval and of a large part of modern history. 

At the commencement of the mediaeval era the Celts were in 
front of the Teutons, chnging to the western edge of the Euro- 
pean continent, and engaged in a bitter contest with these latter 
peoples, which, in the antagonism of England and Ireland, was 
destined to extend itself to our own day. 

The Slavs were in the rear of the Teutonic tribes, pressing 
them on even as the Celts in front were struggling to resist their 
advance. These peoples, backward in civilization, will play only 
an obscure part in the transactions of the mediaeval era, but in 
the course of the modern period will assume a most commanding 
position among the European nations. 

The Persians were in their old seats beyond the Euphrates, 
maintaining there what is called the New Persian Empire, the kings 
^f which, until the rise of the Saracens in the seventh century, were 
the most formidable rivals of the emperors of Constantinople. 

The Arabians were hidden in their deserts ; but in the seventh 
century we shall see them, animated by a wonderful religious 
enthusiasm, issue from their peninsula and begin a contest with 
the Christian nations which, in its varying phases, was destined 
to fill a large part of the mediaeval period. 

The Mongols and Turks were buried in Central Asia. They 
will appear late in the eleventh century, proselytes for the most 
part of Mohammedanism; and, as the religious ardor of the 
Semitic Arabians grows cool, we shall see the Islam standard car- 
ried forward by these zealous converts of another race, and finally, 
in the fifteenth century, we shall see the Crescent, the adopted 
emblem of the new religion, placed by the Ottoman Turks upon 
the dome of St. Sophia in Constantinople. 

As the Middle Ages draw to a close, the remote nations of 
Eastern Asia will gradually come within our circle of vision; 
and, as the Modern Age dawns, we shall catch a glimpse of new 
continents and strange races of men beyond the Atlantic. 



Part I— The Middle Ages 

FIRST PERIOD — THE DARK AGES 

(From the Fall of Rome to the Eleventh Century) 

CHAPTER II 
THE BARBARIAN KINGDOMS 

7. Introductory. — In one of the concluding chapters of our 

Ancient History, as a part of the story of the break-up of the 
Roman Empire in the West, we gave some account of the migra- 
tions and settlements of the Teutonic tribes. In the present 
chapter we shall indicate briefly the political fortunes, for the 
two centuries and more following the fall of Rome, of the prin- 
cipal kingdoms set up by the Teutonic chieftains in the different 
parts of the old Empire. 

8. Kingdom of the Ostrogoths (a.d. 493-553). — Odoacer will 
be recalled as the barbarian chief who dethroned the last of the 
Western Roman emperors.^ His feeble government in Italy 
lasted only seventeen years, when it was brought to an end by 
the invasion of the Ostrogoths (Eastern Goths) under Theodoric, 
the greatest of their chiefs, who set up in Italy a new dominion 
known as the Kingdom of the Ostrogoths. 

The reign of Theodoric covered thirty-three years (a.d. 493- 
526), — years of such quiet and prosperity as Italy had not known 
since the happy era of the Antonines. The king made good 
his promise that his reign should be such that " the only regret 

1 See Ancient History, sec. 560. 

7 



8 



THE BARBARIAN KINGDOMS 



of the people should be that the Goths had not come at an 
earlier period." ^ 

Notwithstanding his generally humane and tolerant disposition, 
Theodoric stained the last years of his reign by various acts of 
cruelty and persecution. Among the victims of his injustice was 
the-renowfied Boethius, one of the most distinguished scholars of 
that time, who was put to death on what seems to have been an 
unfounded charge of disloyalty. During the months of imprison- 
ment which preceded his execution, Boethius wrote his Philoso- 
phice. Consolatio, or " Consolation of Philosophy," a work that 
^ possessed a most 

remarkable attrac- 
tion for a certain 
class of minds 
throughout the 
Middle Ages. 

The kingdom 
established by the 
rare abilities of 
Theodoric lasted 
only twenty-seven 
years after his 
death. It was de- 




^•c 



Fig. I. 



Tomb of Theodoric at Ravenna 
(From a photograph) 



stroyed by the generals of Justinian, Emperor of the East (sec. 50); 
and Italy, freed from the barbarians, was for a time reunited to 
the Empire (a.d. 553). 

9. Kingdom of the Visigoths (a.d. 415-7 it). — The Visigoths 
(W'^estern Goths) were already in possession of Southern Gaul 
and the greater part of Spain when the line of Western Roman 
emperors was brought to an end by the act of Odoacer and his 
companions. Driven south of the Pyrenees by the kings of the 
Franks, they held their possessions in Spain until the beginning 
of the eighth century, when their rule was brought to an end by 

2 Theodoric's chief minister and adviser was Cassiodorus, a statesman and writer 
of Roman birth, whose constant but unfortunately vain effort was to effect a union of 
the conquerors and the conquered, and thus to estabUsh in Italy a strong and perma- 
nent Romano-Gothic state under the rule of the royal house of the Ostrogoths. 



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EUROPE 

IN THE KEIGN OF 

THEODORIC 

About A. D. 500 

Roman Empire [ | Celts [ | Teutonic Settlements 



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30 35 40 45 50 55 





Cherson 



MACEDONIA V^CO^ 




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KINGDOM OF THE BURGUNDIANS 9 

the Saracens (sec. 65). The Visigothic kingdom when thus over- 
turned had lasted nearly three hundred years. During this time the 
conquerors had mingled with the old Romanized inhabitants of 
Spain, so that in the veins of the Spaniard of to-day is blended 
the blood of Iberian, Celt, Roman, and Teuton, together with 
that of the last intruder, the African Moor. 

10. Kingdom of the Burgundians (a.d. 443-534). — Towards 
the middle of the fifth century the Burgundians acquired a per- 
manent settlement in Southeastern Gaul. A portion of their 
ancient dominion still retains from them the name of "Bur- 
gundy." The Burgundians had barely secured a foothold in 
Gaul before they came in collision with the Franks on the north, 
and were reduced by them to a state of dependence. 

11. Kingdom of the Vandals (a.d. 439-533). — About half 
a century before the fall of Rome the Vandals set up a kingdom 
in North Africa. These barbarians were animated by a more 
destructive energy than any other of the Germanic tribes that 
took part in the subversion of the Roman Empire. Their very 
name has passed into all languages as the synonym of wanton 
destruction and violence. 

Being Arian^ Christians, the Vandals persecuted with furious 
zeal the orthodox party, the followers of Athanasius. Moved by 
the entreaties of the African Catholics, the Eastern Emperor 
Justinian sent his general Belisarius to drive the barbarians from 
Africa. The expedition was successful, and Carthage and the 
fruitful fields of Africa were restored to the Empire after having 
suffered the insolence of the barbarian conquerors for the space 
of above a hundred years. The Vandals remaining in the coun- 
try were gradually absorbed by the old Roman population, and 
after a few generations no certain trace of the barbarian invaders 
could be detected in the physical appearance, the language, or 
the customs of the inhabitants of the African coast. The Vandal 
nation had disappeared ; the name alone remained. 

12. The Franks under the Merovingians (a.d. 486-752). — 
The Franks, who were destined to give a new name to Gaul 

S See Ancient History, sec. 537. 



lO THE BARBARIAN KINGDOMS 

and form the nucleus of the French nation, made their first set- 
tlements west of the Rhine about two hundred years before the 
fall of Rome. Among their several chieftains at the time of 
this event was Clovis. Upon the break-up of the Roman Empire 
in the West, Clovis conceived the ambition of erecting a king- 
dom upon the ruins of the Roman power. He attacked Syagrius, 
the Roman governor of Gaul, and at Soissons gained a decisive 
victory over his forces (a.d. 486). Thus was destroyed forever 
in Gaul that Roman authority estabhshed among its tribes more 
than five centuries before by the conquests of Julius Caesar. 

Clovis in a short time extended his authority over the greater 
part of Gaul, reducing to the condition of tributaries the various 
Teutonic tribes that had taken possession of different portions 
of the country. Upon his death (a.d. 511) his extensive domin- 
ions, in accordance with the ancient Teutonic law of inheritance, 
were divided among his four sons. About a century and a half 
of discord followed, by the end of which time the Merovingians ^ 
had become so feeble and inefficient that they were contemp- 
tuously called rois faineants, or "do-nothing kings," and an 
ambitious officer of the crown known as Mayor of the Palace, 
in a way that will be explained a litde later (sec. 72), pushed 
aside the weak Merovingian king and gave to the Frankish mon- 
archy a new royal line, — the Carolingian. 

13. Kingdom of the Lombards (a.d. 568-774). — Barely a 
decade had passed after the recovery of Italy from the Ostro- 
goths by the Eastern Emperor Justinian (sec. 8), before a large 
part of the peninsula was again lost to the Empire through its 
conquest by another barbarian tribe known as the Lombards.^ 
When they entered Italy the Lombards were Christians of the 

4 So called from Merowig, an early chieftain of the race. 

5 The Lombards were, after the Vandals, the most untamed of all the tribes that 
fell upon the Roman provinces, and their conquests were attended with the most 
appalling slaughters and cruelties. The story of Alboin and Rosamund is a typical 
one. Alboin had slain in battle a rival chieftain, the king of the Gepidae, whose 
beautiful daughter, Rosamund, he had just taken as a bride. At a banquet in cele- 
bration of his victories he forced his young queen to drink wine from her father's 
skull, which he had had made into a drinking cup. In revenge for the insult, 
Rosamund plotted the death of her husband and then married the murderer. 



THE LOMBARDS IN ITALY 



II 



Arian sect ; but in time they became converts to the orthodox 
faith, and Pope Gregory I bestowed upon their king a diadem 
which came to be known as the " Iron Crown," for the reason 
that there was wrought into it what was beheved to be one of 
the nails of the cross upon which Christ had suffered. 

The Kingdom of the Lombards was destroyed by Charlemagne, 
the most noted of the Frankish rulers, in the year 774 ; but the 
blood of the invaders had by this time become intermingled 
with that of the 
former subjects of 
the Empire, so that 
throughout all that 
part of the penin- 
sula which is still 
called Lombardy 
after them, one will 
to-day occasionally 
see the fair hair and 
light complexion 
which reveal the 
strain of German 
blood in the veins 
of the present in- 
habitants. 

One important 
result of the Lom- 
bard conquest of 
Italy was the de- 
struction of the po- 
litical unity estab- 
lished by the Romans and the breaking up of the country into 
a multitude of petty states. This resulted from the incomplete 
nature of the conquest and from the loose feudal constitution of 
the Lombard monarchy, which was rather a group of practically 
independent duchies than a real kingdom. Not until our own 
day did there emerge from this political chaos a united Italy. 




Map of Italy under the Lombards 
Showing how the political unity of the peninsula was 
shattered by the Lombard conquest. The unshaded 
portions represent the regions taken possession of by 
the barbarians; the shaded areas indicate the lands 
which remained in the hands of the Eastern Emperor 



12 THE BARBARIAN KINGDOMS 

14. The Anglo-Saxon Conquest of Britain. — In the fifth cen- 
tury of our era, being then engaged in her death struggle with 
the barbarians, Rome withdrew her legions from Britain in order 
to protect Italy. Thus that province was left exposed to the 
depredations of the Anglo-Saxon corsairs from the Continent. 
No other province of the Roman Empire made such determined 
and heroic resistance against the barbarians. It is to this period 
of desperate struggle that the famous King Arthur belongs. The 
legends that have gathered about the name of this national hero 
are mostly mythical ; yet it is possible that he had a real exist- 
ence and that the name represents one or more of the most 
valiant of the Celtic chiefs who battled so long and heroically 
against the pagan invaders.® 

The conquerors of Britain belonged to three Teutonic tribes, 
— the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes, — but among the Celts they all 
passed under the name of Saxons, and among themselves, after 
they began to draw together into a single nation, under that of 
Angles, whence the name England (Angle-land). 

By the close of the sixth, century the invading bands had set 
up in the conquered parts of the island eight or nine, or perhaps 
more, kingdoms, — frequently designated, though somewhat inac- 
curately, as the Heptarchy. For the space of two hundred years 
there was an almost perpetual strife for supremacy among the 
leading states. Finally, Egbert, king of Wessex (a.d. 802-839), 
brought all the other kingdoms to a subject or tributary condi- 
tion, and became in reality, though he seems never, save on one 
occasion, to have actually assumed the title, the first king of 
England. 

15. Teutonic Tribes outside the Empire. — We have now spoken 
of the most important of the Teutonic tribes which forced them- 
selves within the limits of the Roman Empire in the West, and that 
there, upon the ruins of the civilization they had overthrown, laid 
or helped to lay the foundations of the modern nations of Italy, 
Spain, France, and England. Beyond the boundaries of the old 

6 Many of the hard-pressed Britons fled across the English Channel to the adja- 
cent shores of France, and gave name to the French province of Brittany. 



TEUTONIC TRIBES OUTSIDE THE EMPIRE 13 

Empire were still other tribes and clans of this same mighty family 
of nations, — tribes and clans that were destined to play great 
parts in European history. 

On the east, beyond the Rhine, were the ancestors of the 
modern Germans. Notwithstanding the immense hosts that the 
forests and morasses of Germany had poured into the Roman 
provinces, the fatherland, in the sixth century of our era, seemed 
still as crowded as before the great migration began. These tribes 
were yet barbarians in manners, and, for the most part, pagans in 
religion. In the northwest of Europe were the Scandinavians, 
the ancestors of the modern Danes, Swedes, and Norwegians. 
They were as yet untouched either by the civilization or the 
religion of Rome. 



Selections from the Sources."^ — The Letters of Cassiodorus (trans, by 
Thomas Hodgkin). Read bk. i, letters 24 and 35 ; bk. ii, letters 32 and 
34; bk. iii, letters 17, 19, 29, 31, and 43; bk. xi, letters 12 and 13; bk. xii, 
letter 20. These letters are invaluable in showing what was the general 
condition of things in the transition period between ancient and mediaeval 
times. BoETHius, Consolation of Philosophy (Bohn). "Whoso would 
understand," says Hodgkin, "the thoughts that were working in the 
noblest minds of the mediaeval Europe would do well to give a few hours' 
study to the once world-renowned ' Consolation of Philosophy.' " Colby, 
Selections^ Extract 5, " The Coming of the English to Britain." 

Secondary Works. — Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders and Theodoric 
the Goth. Hodgkin is recognized as the best authority on the period of the 
migration. Villari, The Barbarian Invasions of Italy. Gummere, Ger- 
manic Origins ; an authoritative and interesting work on the early culture 
of the Germans. Gibbon, The Decline and Fall, chaps, xxxviii and xxxix. 
Emerton, An Introduction to the Study of the Middle Ages, chaps, vi and 
vii. B]EMONT and Monod, Mediceval Europe, chaps, iv-vii. MuNRO and 
Sellery, Mediceval Civilization, pp. 44-59. This book consists of selec- 
tions from modern authors, translated and adapted to school use by the 
editors. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Boethius and his Consolation of Phi- 
losophy. 2. Manners and customs of the early Germans. 3. Cassiodorus. 
4. The character of Clovis. 5. " The groans of the Britons." 

7 For full names of authors and for further information concerning works cited, 
see General Bibliography at end of book. 



CHAPTER III 
THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

I. The Conversion of the Barbarians 

i6. Introductory. — The most important event in the history of 
the tribes that took possession of the Roman Empire in the West 
was their conversion to Christianity. Many of the barbarians were 
converted before or soon after their entrance into the Empire ; 
to this circumstance the Roman provinces owed their immunity 
from the excessive cruelties which pagan barbarians seldom fail 
to inflict upon a subjected enemy. Alaric left untouched the 
treasures of the churches of the Roman Christians because his 
own faith was also Christian. For like reason the Vandal king 
Geiseric yielded to the prayers of Pope Leo the Great and prom- 
ised to leave to the inhabitants of the imperial city their lives.^ 
The more tolerable fate of Italy, Spain, and Gaul, as compared 
with the hard fate of Britain, is owing, in part at least, to the fact 
that the tribes which overran those countries had become in the 
main converts to Christianity before they crossed the boundaries 
of the Empire, while the Saxons when they entered Britain were 
still untamed pagans. 

17. Conversion of the Goths, Vandals, and Other Tribes. — The 
first converts to Christianity among the barbarians beyond the 
limits of the Empire were won from among the Goths. Foremost 
of the apostles that arose among them was Ulfilas, who translated 
the Scriptures into the Gothic language, omitting from his version, 
however, the Books of the Kings, as he feared that the stirring 
recital of wars and battles in that portion of the Word might kindle 
into too fierce a flame the martial ardor of his new converts. 

1 See Ancient History, sees. 553 and 559, 
14 



CONVERSION OF. THE FRANKS 1 5 

What happened in the case of the Goths happened also in the 
case of most of the barbarian tribes that participated in the over- 
throw of the Roman Empire in the West. By the time of the fall 
of Rome the Goths, the Vandals, the Suevi, and the Burgundians 
had become proselytes to Christianity. They, however, professed 
the Arian creed, which had been condemned by the great council 
of the Church held at Nicsea during the reign of Constantine the 
Great. Hence they were regarded as heretics by the Catholic 
Church, and all had to be reconverted to the orthodox creed, 
which good work was gradually accomplished. 

The remaining Teutonic tribes of whose conversion we shall 
speak — the Franks, the Anglo-Saxons, and the chief tribes of 
Germany — embraced at the outset the Catholic faith. 

18. Conversion of the Franks; Importance of this Event. — The 
Franks when they entered the Empire, like the Angles and Saxons 
when they landed in Britain, were still pagans. Christianity gained 
way very slowly among them until a supposed interposition by the 
Christian God in their behalf led the king and nation to adopt 
the new religion in place of their old faith. The circumstances, 
as reported by tradition, were these. In a terrible battle between 
the Alemanni and the Franks under their king Clovis, the situation 
of the Franks had become desperate. Then Clovis, falling upon 
his knees, called upon the God of the Christians, and vowed that 
if he would give him the. victory he would become his follower. 
The battle turned in favor of the Franks, and Clovis, faithful to 
his vow, was baptized, and with him three thousand of his warriors. 

This story of the conversion of Clovis and his Franks illustrates 
how the belief of the barbarians in omens and divine interpositions, 
and particularly their feeling that if their gods did not do for them 
all they wanted done they had a right to set them aside and 
choose others in their stead, contributed to their conversion, and 
how the reception of the new faith was often a tribal or national 
affair rather than a matter of personal conviction. 

"The conversion of the Franks," says the historian Milman, 
"was the most important event in its remote as well as its 
immediate consequences in European history." It was of such 



i6 



THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 




moment for the reason that the Franks embraced the orthodox 
Catholic faith, while almost all the other German invaders of the 
Empire had embraced the heretical Arian creed. This secured 
them the loyalty of their Roman subjects and also gained for them 
the official favor of the Church of Rome. Thus was laid the basis 
of the ascendancy in the West of the Frankish kings. 

19. Augustine's Mission to England. — In the year a.d. 596 
Pope Gregory I sent the monk Augustine with a band of forty 

companions to teach 
the Christian faith in 
Britain, in whose peo- 
ple he had become 
interested through see- 
ing in the slave market 
at Rome some fair- 
faced captives from 
that remote region. 

The monks were 
favorably received by 
the English, who 
listened attentively to 
the story the strangers 
had come to tell them; 
and being persuaded that the tidings were true, they burned the 
temples of Woden and Thor, and were in large numbers baptized 
in the Christian faith. 

One of the most important consequences of the conversion of 
Britain was the reestablishment of that connection of the island 
with Roman civilization which had been severed by the calamities 
of the fifth century. As Green says, • — he is speaking of the 
embassy of St. Augustine, — " The march of the monks as they 
chanted their solemn litany was in one sense a return of the 
Roman legions who withdrew at the trurhpet call of Alaric. . . . 
Practically Augustine's landing renewed that union with the west- 
ern world which the landing of Hengist had destroyed. The new 
England was admitted into the older commonwealth of nations. 



Fig. 2. — St. Martin's Church, Canterbury 
(From a photograph) 

This church occupies the site of a chapel built in 
the Roman period and standing at the time of the 
landing of the monk Augustine, in the year 597. 
Its walls show some of the Roman bricks of the 
original church 



THE CONVERSION OF IRELAND 



17 




The civilization, art, letters, which had fled before the sword of 
the English conquerors, returned with the Christian faith." 

20. The Conversion of Ireland ; lona The spiritual conquest 

of Ireland was effected largely by a zealous priest named Patricius 
(d. about A.D. 469), better known as St. Patrick, the patron saint 
of Ireland. With such success were his labors attended that by 
the time of his death a great part of the island had embraced the 
Christian faith. 

Never did any race receive the Gospel with more ardent 
enthusiasm. The Irish or Celtic Church sent out its devoted 
missionaries into the Pictish highlands, into the forests of Ger- 
many, and among 
the wilds of Alps 
and Apennines.^ 
Among the numer- 
ous religious houses 
founded by the 
Celtic missionaries 
was the famous 
monastery estab- 
lished A.D. 563 by 
the Irish monk St. 
Columba, on the 
little isle of lona, 
just off the Pictish coast. lona became a most renowned center 
of Christian learning and missionary zeal, and for almost two 
centuries was the point from which radiated light through the 
darkness of the surrounding heathenism. Fitly has it been called 
the Nursery of Saints and the Oracle of the West.^ 

2 These Irish missionaries were not merely the representatives of Christianity ; 
their time and strength were devoted to many purely secular duties. " They 
were instructors in every known branch of science and learning of the time, 
possessors and bearers of a higher culture than was at that period to be found 
anywhere on the Continent, and can surely claim to have been the pioneers, — 
to have laid the corner stone of western culture on the Continent." — Zimmer, 
The Irish Element in Mediceval Culture, p. 130. 

3 In Southern Germany (now Switzerland) the Irish monk Gallus established 
(A.D. 613) the celebrated monastery of St. Gall, which at a later time became one 
of the chief seats of learning in Central Europe. 



Fig. 3. — The Ruins of Iona. (After an 
old drawing) 

That man is little to be envied whose patriotism would 
not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose 
piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of 
lona.-' — Dr. Johnson, A Journey to the Western 
Isles of Scotland 



i8 



THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 



21. Rivalry between the Roman and the Celtic Church; The 
Council of Whitby (a.d. 664). — From the very moment that 
Augustine touched the shores of Britain and summoned the 
Welsh clergy to acknowledge the discipline of the Roman Church, 
there had been a growing jealousy between the Latin and Celtic 
churches, which had now risen into the bitterest rivalry and 
strife. So long had the Celtic Church been cut off from all rela- 
tions with Rome, that it had come to differ somewhat from it in 
the matter of certain ceremonies and observances, such as the 
time of keeping Easter and the form of the tonsure.* 

With a view to settling the quarrel, Oswy, king of Northumbria, 
who thought that " as they all expected the same kingdom of 







Fig. 4. — The Ruins of Whitby. (From a photograph by the author) 

heaven, so they ought not to differ in the celebration of the 
divine mysteries," called a synod composed of representatives of 
both parties, at the monastery of Whitby. The chief question 
of debate, which was argued before the king by the ablest advo- 
cates of both churches, was the proper time for the observance 
of Easter. The debate was warm, and hot words were exchanged. 
Finally, Wilfrid, the speaker for the Roman party, happening 
to quote the words of Christ to Peter, " To thee will I give the 
keys of the kingdom of heaven," the king asked the Celtic monks 
if these words were really spoken by Christ to that apostle, and 
upon their admitting that they were, Oswy said : " He being the 

4 In the Roman tonsure the top of the head was shaven, in the Celtic the front 
part only. 



LITERATURE OF THE ANGLO-SAXONS 19 

doorkeeper, ... I will in all things obey his decrees, lest when 
I come to the gates of the kingdom of heaven, there should be 
none to open them," 

The decision of the prudent Oswy gave the British Isles to 
Rome; for not only was all England soon won to the Roman 
side, but the churches and monasteries of Wales and Ireland and 
Scotland came in time to conform to the Roman standard and 
custom. "By the assistance of our Lord," says the pious Latin 
chronicler, " the monks were brought to the canonical observa- 
tion of Easter and the right mode of the tonsure." 

One important result of the Roman victory was the hastening 
of the political unity of England through its ecclesiastical unity. 
The Celtic Church, in marked contrast with the Latin, was utterly 
devoid of capacity for organization. It could have done nothing 
in the way of developing among the several Anglo-Saxon states 
the sentiment of nationality. On the other hand, the Roman 
Church, through the exercise of a central authority, through 
national synods and general legislation, overcame the isolation 
of the different kingdoms and helped powerfully to draw them 
together into a common political life. 

22. Pagan and Christian Literature of the Anglo-Saxons. — A 
strong side light is cast upon our ancestors' change of religion by 
two famous poems which date from the Anglo-Saxon period, of 
our literature. One of these, called Beowidf, was composed 
while our forefathers were yet pagans, and probably before they 
left the Continent ; the other, known as the Paraphrase of the 
Scriptures, was written soon after their conversion to Christianity. 

Beowulf is an epic poem which tells of the exploits of an 
heroic Viking, Beowulf by name, who delivers the people from a 
terrible monster that feasted upon sleeping men. It is alive 
with the instincts of paganism, and is a faithful reflection of the 
rough heathen times in which it had birth. Every passage dis- 
plays the love of the savage for coarse horrors and brutal slaugh- 
ters. Thus it runs : " The wretched wight seized quickly a 
sleeping warrior, slit him unawares, bit his bone-locker, drank his 
blood, in morsels swallowed him; soon had he all eaten, feet 



20 THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

and fingers." Before another can be made a victim Beowulf 
closes with the monster. " The hall thundered, the ale of all the 
Danes and earls was spilt. Angry, fierce were the strong fighters, 
the hall was full of din. It was great wonder that the wine-hall 
stood above the warlike beasts, that the fair earth-house fell not 
to the ground." Such was the gleeman's song which dehghted 
our Saxon forefathers as they drank and caroused in their great 
mead halls. 

In striking contrast with the pagan hero poem stands the 
PharaphrasCy the first fruits in English literature of the mission 
of Augustine. This consists of Bible stories retold in verse. 
These metrical paraphrases, it is now believed, were composed, in 
the main, between the seventh and the tenth century by different 
poets, who seem to have been disciples or imitators of a certain 
monk of Whitby, named Caedmon, upon whom, according to a 
beautiful legend transmitted .to us by the Venerable Bede,^ the 
gift of song had been miraculously bestowed, and who, though he 
could neither read nor write, turned into sweet verses, as they 
were recited to him, many of the graphic tales of Holy Writ. In 
these compositions is reflected in a wonderful manner the revolu- 
tion in thought and feeling and in aim and purpose of life which 
the reception of Christian teachings and doctrines, in place of 
their earlier beliefs and ideas, wrought in the pagan conquerors 
of Britain. 

23. The Conversion of Germany. — The conversion of the tribes 
of Germany was effected by Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, and Frankish 
missionaries, and the sword of Charlemagne (sec. 74). The great 
apostle of Germany was the Saxon Winfrid, better known as St. 
Boniface. During a long and intensely active hfe he founded 
schools and monasteries, organized churches, preached and bap- 
tized, and at last died a martyr's death (a.d. 753). Through 

5 Bede the Venerable (about a.d. 673-735) \vas a pious and learned Northum- 
brian monk, who wrote, among other works, an invaluable one entitled Historia 
Bcclesiastica Geniis Anglorum,^^ The Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation." 
The work recites, as its central theme, the story of how our forefathers were won 
to the Christian faith. We are indebted to Bede for a large part of our knowledge 
of early England. 



THE CONVERSION OF RUSSIA 21 

him, as says Milman, the Saxon invasion of England flowed back 
upon the Continent. 

The Christianizing of the tribes of Germany reUeved the Teu- 
tonic folk of Western Europe from the constant peril of massacre 
by their heathen kinsmen, and erected a strong barrier in Central 
Europe against the advance of the waves of Turanian paganism 
and Mohammedanism which for centuries beat so threateningly 
against the eastern frontiers of Germany. 

24. The Conversion of Russia. — Vladimir the Great (d. 1015) 
was the Clovis of Russia. This ruler, according to the account 
of the matter that has come down to us, having had urged upon 
his attention the claims of different rehgions, sent out envoys to 
make investigation respecting the relative merits of Mohamme- 
danism, the Jewish rehgion, and Latin and Greek Christianity. 
The commissioners reported in favor of the religion of Constan- 
tinople, having been brought to this mind by what seemed to 
them the supernatural splendors of the ceremonials that they 
had witnessed in the great Church of St. Sophia. 

Vladimir caused the great wooden idol of the chief god of his 
people to be hurled into the Dnieper, and his subjects to be bap- 
tized in its waters by the Christian priests. This act of Vladimir 
marks the real beginning of the evangelization of Russia (988). 

That the Slavic tribes should have come under the religious 
influence of Constantinople instead of under that of Rome had 
far-reaching consequences for Russian history. This circum- 
stance cut off Russia from sympathy with the Catholic West and 
shut her out from all the civilizing influences that accompanied 
Latin Christianity. 

25. Christianity in the North. — The. progress of Christianity 
in the North was slow ; but gradually, during the ninth, tenth, 
and eleventh centuries, the missionaries of the Church won over 
all the Scandinavian peoples. One important effect of their con- 
version was the checking of those piratical expeditions which 
during all the centuries of their pagan history had been constantly 
putting out from the fiords of the Northern peninsulas and 
vexing every shore to the south. 



22 THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

By about the year looo all Europe was claimed by Christianity, 
save the regions of the Northwest about the Baltic, which were 
inhabited chiefly by the still pagan Finns and Lapps, parts of 
what is now Russia, and the larger portion of the Iberian 
peninsula, which was in the hands of the Mohammedan Moors. 

26. Reaction of Paganism on Christianity. — Thus were the 
conquerors of the Empire met and conquered by Christianity. 
The victory, it must be confessed, was in a great degree a victory 
rather in name than in fact. The Church could not all at once 
leaven the great mass of heathenism which had so suddenly been 
brought within its pale. For a long time after they were called 
Christians, the barbarians, coarse and cruel and self-willed and 
superstitious as they were, understood very little of the doctrines 
and exhibited still less of the true spirit of the religion they pro- 
fessed. To this depressing reaction of Teutonic barbarism upon 
the Church is without doubt to be attributed in large measure the 
deplorable moral state of Europe during so large a part of the 
mediaeval ages. 



II. The Rise of Monasticism 

27. Monasticism defined; the System fostered by Scripture 
Teachings. — It was during the period between the third and the 
sixth century that there grew up in the Church the institution 
known as Monasticism. This was so remarkable a system, and 
one that exerted so profound an influence upon mediaeval and 
even later history, that we must here acquaint ourselves with 
at least its spirit and aims. 

The term Monasticism, in its widest application, denotes a 
life of austere self-denial and of seclusion from the world, with 
the object of promoting the interests of the soul. As thus defined, 
the system embraced two prominent classes of ascetics : (i) her- 
mits, or anchorites, — persons who, retiring from the world, lived 
solitary lives in desolate places; (2) cenobites, or monks, who 
formed communities and lived usually under a common roof. 



CHRISTIAN ASCETICISM 23 

Christian asceticism® was fostered by teachings drawn from 
various texts of the Bible. Thus the apostle- St. Paul had said, 
" He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the 
Lord ; ... but he that is married careth for the things that are 
of the world." ^ And Christ himself had declared, "If any man 
come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and 
children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he 
cannot be my disciple";^ and, again, he had said to the rich 
young man, " If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, 
and give to the poor." ® These passages, and others like them, 
taken literally, tended greatly to confirm the belief of the ascetic 
that his life of isolation and poverty and abstinence was the most 
perfect life and the surest way to win salvation. 

28. St. Antony, "the Father of the Hermits." — St. Antony, 
an Egyptian ascetic (b. about a.d. 251), who by his example and 
influence gave a tremendous impulse to the movement, is called 
the " Father of the Hermits." The romance of his life, written 
by the celebrated Athanasius, stirred the whole Christian world 
and led thousands to renounce society and in imitation of the 
saint to flee to the desert. It is estimated that before the close 
of the fourth century the population of the desert in many dis- 
tricts in Egypt was equal to that of the cities. 

Most renowned of all the anchorites' of the East was St. Simeon 
Stylites, the Saint of the Pillar (d.A.D. 459), who spent thirty-six 
years on a column only three feet in diameter at the top, which he 
had gradually raised to a height of over fifty feet.^*^ 

29. Monasticism in the West. — During the fourth century 
the anchorite type of asceticism, which was favored by the mild 
climate of the Eastern lands and especially by that of Egypt, 
assumed in some degree the monastic form; that is to say, the 
fame of this or that anchorite or hermit drew about him a number 

6 The ascetic idea of life was by no means original with Christianity. Brahman- 
ism has always had its ascetics and hermits. All Buddhistic lands are to-day filled 
with monasteries and monks. About the time of Christ there were to be found in 
Syria among the Jews the Essenes_, a sect of religious enthusiasts whose members 
led a solitary and ascetic life. 7 i Cor. vii, 32, 33. 8 Luke xiv. 26. 

9 Matt.xix. 21. 10 Read Tennyson's poem, " St. Simeon Stylites." 



24 



THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 



of disciples, whose rude huts or cells formed what was known as 
a laura, the nucleus of a monastery. 

Soon after the cenobite sys.tem had been established in the East 
it was introduced into Europe, and in an astonishingly short space 
of time spread throughout all the Western countries where Chris- 
tianity had gained a foothold. Here it prevailed to the almost 
total exclusion of the hermit mode of life. Monasteries arose on 




Fig. 5. — Ruins of the Church of St. Simeon Stylites, near 
Antioch, Syria. (From Part II of the Publications of the Amer- 
ican Archaeological Expedition to Syria in 1899-1900) 

This church was erected, a few years after Simeon's death, around the pillar (the 
base of which is to be seen in the cut) upon which the saint had passed so many 
years. It became one of the most popular of the mediaeval pilgrim shrines 

every side. The number that fled to these retreats was vastly 
augmented by the disorder and terror attending the invasion of 
the barbarians and the overthrow of the Empire in the West. 

30. The Rule of St. Benedict. — With the view to introducing 
some sort of regularity into the practices and austerities of the 
monks, rules were early prescribed for their observance. The 
three essential requirements or vows of the monk were poverty, 
chastity, and obedience. 

The greatest legislator of the monks was St. Benedict of Nursia 
Ca-d. 480-543), the founder of the celebrated monastery of Monte 



MONASTIC REFORMS 



25 



K, 



.^.. 



■■V.;S&^ 






Cassino, situated midway between Rome and Naples in Italy. 
His code was to the religious world what the Corpus Juris~Civilis 
of Justinian (sec. 50) was to the lay society of Europe. Many of 
his rules were most wise and practical, as, for instance, one that 
made manual work a pious duty, and another that required the 
monk to spend an allotted time each day in sacred reading. 

The monks who subjected themselves to the rule of St. Bene- 
dict were known as Benedictines. The order became immensely 

popular. Atone ... 

time it embraced 
about forty thou- 
sand abbeys. 

31. Monastic Re- 
forms; Cluny. — 
Monasticism as an 
active and potent 
force in the history 
of the West has a 
long and wonderful 
history of more 
than a thousand 
years. This history 
presents one domi- 
nant fact, — ever- 
renewed reform 
movements in the 
monasteries. 
Scarcely was a 
monastery or a 

monastic order established before the acquisition of wealth brought 
in self-indulgence and laxity of discipline. But there was always 
among the backsliding dwellers in the cloisters a "saving rem- 
nant," and upon these choice souls the spirit of reform was sure 
to descend, and thus it happens that with the reform movements 
marking the history of the monks are associated the names of many 
of the purest and most exalted characters of the mediaeval ages. 




Fig. 6. — The Simopetra Monastery of 
Mount Athos. (From a photograph) 

' The convents of Mt. Athos in their present state give 
us a very accurate notion of the great monasteries of 
Europe, at the close of the twelfth century." — S aba- 
tier, Life of St. Francis of Assist 



26 



THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 



Among the earliest and most noteworthy of these reform move- 
ments was that which resulted in the founding in the year 910 of 
the celebrated monastery of Cluny in Burgundy. The influences 
which radiated from the cloisters of Cluny left a deep impression 
upon more than two centuries of history (sees. 123 and 133). 

32 . Services of the Monks to Civilization. — The early estab- 
lishment of the monastic system in the Church resulted in great 
advantages to the new world that was shaping itself out of the 
ruins of the old. The monks, especially the Benedictines, became 
agriculturists, and by patient labor converted the wild and marshy 
lands which they received as gifts from princes and others into 
fruitful fields, thus redeeming from barrenness some of the most 
desolate districts of Europe. 

The monks also became missionaries, and it was largely to their 
zeal and devotion that the Church owed her speedy and signal 
victory over the barbarians. It is about the names of such de- 
voted monks as Saints Columba, Gallus, and Boniface that gathers 

much of the romance of the mis- 
sions of the mediaeval Church. 
The quiet air of the monas- 
teries nourished learning ^s well 
as piety. The monks became 
teachers, and under the shelter 
of the monasteries estabhshed 
schools which were the nurseries 
of learning during the earlier 
Middle Ages and the homes for 
centuries of the best intellectual 
life of Europe. 

The monks also became copy- 
ists, and with great painstaking 
and industry gathered and multipHed ancient manuscripts, and 
thus preserved and transmitted to the modern world much classical 
learning and literature that would otherwise have been lost. Almost 
all the remains of the Greek and Latin classics that we possess 
have come to us through the agency of the monks. 




Fig. 7. — A Monk Copyist 

(From a manuscript of the 

fifteenth century) 



THE RISE OF THE PAPACY 2/ 

The monks also became the chroniclers of the events of their 
own times, so it is to them that we are indebted for a great part 
of our knowledge of the early mediaeval centuries. Thus the 
scriptorium, or writing room of the monastery, held the place in 
mediaeval society that the great pubHshing house holds in the 
modern world. . 

The monks became further the almoners of the pious and the 
wealthy, and distributed alms to the poor and needy. Everywhere 
the monasteries opened their hospitable doors to the weary, the 
sick, and the discouraged. In a word, these retreats were the 
inns, the asylums, and the hospitals of the mediaeval ages. This 
spirit of helpfulness and charity found its embodiment in the 
women who became nuns. To a woman is to be attributed the 
estabhshment of the first Christian hospital.^ 

III. The Rise of the Papacy 

33. The Empire within the Empire. — Long before the fall of 
Rome there had begun to grow up within the Roman Empire an 
ecclesiastical state, which in its constitution and its administrative 
system was shaping itself upon the imperial model. This spiritual 
empire, like the secular empire, possessed a hierarchy of officers, 
of which deacons, priests or presbyters, and bishops were the 
most important. The bishops collectively formed what is known 
as the episcopate. There were four grades of bishops, namely, 
country bishops, city bishops, metropoHtans or archbishops, and 
patriarchs. At the end of the fourth century there were five 
patriarchates, that is, regions ruled by patriarchs. These centered 
in the great cities of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, 
and Jerusalem. 

Among the patriarchs, the patriarchs of Rome were accorded 
almost universally a precedence in honor and dignity. They 

11 " A Roman lady, named Fabiola, in the fourth century founded at Rome, as 
an act of penance, the first public hospital, and the charity planted by that woman's 
hand overspread the world, and will alleviate, to the end of time, the darkest 
anguish of humanity." — Lecky, History of European Morals, vol. ii, p. 80; 
quoted by Wishart, Monks and Monasteries, p. 105. 



28 THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

claimed further a precedence in authority and jurisdiction, and 
this was already very widely recognized. Before the close of the 
eighth century there was firmly established over a great part of 
Christendom what we may call an ecclesiastical monarchy. 

Besides the influence of great men, such as Leo the Great, 
Gregory the Great, and Nicholas I, who held the seat of St. Peter, 
there were various historical circumstances that contributed to 
the realization by the Roman bishops of their claim to suprem- 
acy and aided them vastly in establishing the almost universal 
authority of the see of Rome. In the following paragraphs we 
shall enumerate several of these favoring circumstances. These 
matters constitute the great landmarks in the rise and early 
growth of the Papacy. 

34. The Belief in the Primacy of St. Peter and in the Founding 
by him of the Church at Rome. — The Catholic Church teaches 
that the apostle Peter was given by the Master primacy among 
his fellow apostles and, furthermore, that Christ intrusted that 
disciple with the keys of the kingdom of heaven and invested 
him with superlative authority as teacher and interpreter of the 
Word by the commission "Feed my sheep"; . . . "feed my 
lambs," thus giving into his charge the entire flock of the 
Church. It also teaches that the apostle Peter himself founded 
the church at Rome. Without doubt he preached at Rome and 
suffered martyrdom there under the Emperor Nero. 

These beliefs and interpretations of history, which make the 
Roman bishops the successors of the first of the apostles and the 
holders of his seat, contributed greatly, of course, to enhance their 
reputation and to justify their claim to a primacy of authority over 
all the dignitaries of the Church. 

35. Advantages of their Position at the Political Center of the 
World. — The claims of the Roman bishops were in the early cen- 
turies greatly favored by the spell in which the world was held by 
the name and prestige of imperial Rome. Thence it had been 
accustomed to receive commands in all temporal matters ; how 
very natural, then, that thither it should turn for command and 



THE RISE OF THE PAPACY 29 

guidance in spiritual affairs. The Roman bishops in thus occupy- 
ing the geographical and political center of the world enjoyed a 
position of preeminence over all other bishops and patriarchs. 
The halo that during many centuries of wonderful history had 
gathered about the Eternal City came naturally to invest with 
a kind of aureole the head of the Christian bishop. 

36. Effect of the Removal of the Imperial Government to Con- 
stantinople. — Nor was this advantage that was given the Roman 
bishops by their position at Rome lost when the old capital 
ceased to be an imperial city. The removal, by the acts of Dio- 
cletian and Constantine, of the chief seat of the government to 
the East, instead of diminishing the power and dignity of the 
Roman bishops, tended greatly to promote their claims and 
authority. It left the pontiff the foremost personage in Rome. 

37. The Pastor as Protector of Rome. — With the advent of the 
barbarians there came another occasion for the Roman bishops 
to widen their influence and enhance their authority. Rome's 
extremity was their opportunity. Thus it will be recalled how 
mainly through the intercession of the pious Pope Leo the Great 
the fierce Attila was persuaded to turn back and spare the imperial 
city;^ and how the same bishop, in the year a.d. 455, also ap- 
peased in a measure the wrath of the Vandal Geiseric and shielded 
the inhabitants from the worst passions of a barbarian soldiery .^^ 

Thus when the emperors, the natural defenders of the capital, 
were unable to protect it, the unarmed Pastor was able, through 
the awe and reverence inspired by his holy office, to render serv- 
ices that could not but result in bringing increased honor and 
dignity to the Roman see. 

38. Effects upon the Papacy of the Extinction of the Roman 
Empire in the West. — But if the misfortunes of the Empire in the 

12 Legend tells how Attila, after his retreat from Italy, being taunted for having 
allowed himself to be turned back by an unarmed bishop, replied, " It was not the 
bishop of whom I was afraid but the man who stood behind him." The legend 
explains that it was St. Peter whom Attila had seen standing with menacing gesture 
behind the pope. The legend, read aright, is true. Behind every venerated bishop 
and holy abbot the barbarians saw a heavenly figure, whose restraining gesture they 
dared not disregard. >> 

18 See Ancient History^ sees. 558 and 559. 



30 THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

West tended to the enhancement of the reputation and influence 
of the Roman bishops, much more did its final downfall tend to 
the same end. Upon the surrender of the sovereignty of the 
West into the hands of the Emperor of the East, the bishops of 
Rome became the most important personages in Western Europe, 
and being so far removed from the court at Constantinople grad- 
ually assumed almost imperial powers.^* They became the arbiters 
between the barbarian chiefs and the Italians, and to them were 
referred for decision the disputes arising between cities, states, 
and kings. Especially did the bishops and archbishops through- 
out the West in their contests with the Arian barbarian rulers look 
to Rome for advice and help. It is easy to see how greatly these 
things tended to strengthen the authority and increase the influ- 
ence of the Roman bishops. 

39. The Missions of Rome. — Again, the early missionary zeal 
of the church at Rome made her the mother of many churches, 
all of whom looked up to her with affectionate and grateful loy- 
alty. Thus the Angles and Saxons, won to the faith by the mis- 
sionaries of Rome, conceived a deep veneration for the holy see 
and became its most devoted children. To Rome it was that the 
Christian Britons made their most frequent pilgrimages, and 
thither they sent their offering of St. Peter's pence. And when 
the Saxons became missionaries to their pagan kinsmen of the 
Continent they transplanted into the heart of Germany these same 
feelings of filial attachment and love. The monk St. Boniface, 
"the Apostle of Germany," with whose labors we are already 
familiar (sec. 23), while winning the heathen of the German 
forests to a love for the Cross, inspired them also with a pro- 
found reverence for the Roman see. Boniface himself took a 
solemn oath of fealty to the Roman pontiff, and the bishops 
of the German churches that arose through the efforts of this 
zealous apostle were required to promise a like obedience to 
Rome. 

14 During this time Gregory the Great (590-604), who was the most eminent of 
the early popes, ruled as though he were a temporal prince, and administered affairs 
almost like an independent sovereign. " 



THE RISE OF THE PAPACY 



31 



40. Result of the Fall of Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria 
before the Saracens. — In the seventh century all the great cities 
of the East fell into the hands of the Mohammedans. This was 
a matter of tremendous consequence for the church at Rome, 
since in every one of these great capitals there was, or might 
have been, a rival of the Roman bishop. The virtual erasure of 
Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria from the map of Christendom 
left only one city, Constantinople, that could possibly nourish 
a rival of the Roman church. Thus did the very misfortunes 
of Christendom give an added security to the ever-increasing 
authority of the Roman prelate. 

41. The Iconoclastic Controversy; the Popes become Temporal 
Sovereigns. — A dispute about the use of images in worship, known 
in Church history as the "War of the Iconoclasts," which broke 
out in the eighth century between the Greek churches of the 
East and the Latin churches of the West, drew after it far- 
reaching consequences as respects the growing power of the 
Roman pontiffs. 

Even long before the seventh century the churches both in the 
East and in the West had become crowded with images or pictures 
of the apostles, saints, and martyrs, which to the ignorant classes 
at least were objects of superstitious veneration. But the great 

disaster which just at this period befell the Church in the East 

the irruption and conquests of the Arab Mohammedans — con- 
tributed to create among the Christians there a strong sentiment 
against the use of images as aids in worship. A party arose, who, 
like the party of reform among the ancient Hebrews, declared 
that God had given the Church over into the hands of the infidels 
because the Christians had departed from his true worship and 
fallen into idolatry. These opposers of the use of images in 
worship were given the name of Iconoclasts (image-breakers). 

Leo the Isaurian, who came to the throne of Constantinople in 
717, was a most zealous Iconoclast. The Greek churches of the 
East having been cleared of images, the Emperor resolved to 
clear also the Latin churches of the West of these symbols. To 
this end he issued a decree that they should not be used. 



32 THE CHURCH AND ITS INSTITUTIONS 

The bishop of Rome not only opposed the execution of the 
edict but by the ban of excommunication cut off the Emperor 
and all the iconoclastic churches of the East from communion 
with the true Catholic Church. Though images — paintings and 
mosaics only — were permanently restored in the Eastern churches 
in 842, still by this time other causes of alienation had arisen, and 
the breach between the two sections of Christendom could not 
now be closed. The final outcome was the permanent separation, 
in the last half of the eleventh century, of the Church of the East 
from that of the West. The former became known as the Greek, 
Byzantine, or Eastern Church j the latter, as the Latin, Roman, or 
Catholic Church. 

The East was thus eventually lost to the Roman see, but the 
loss was more than made good by fresh accessions of power in the 
West. In this quarrel with the Eastern emperors the Roman bishops 
formed an alliance with the Frankish princes of the Carolingian 
house (sec. 72). We shall a little later tell briefly the story of this 
alliance. Never did allies render themselves more serviceable to 
each other. The popes consecrated the Frankish chieftains as kings 
and emperors; the grateful Frankish kings defended the popes 
against all their enemies, imperial and barbarian, and dowering 
them with cities and provinces, laid the basis of their temporal 
power.^^ 

15 The cause of the Roman pontiffs, from about the eighth or ninth century for- 
ward, was greatly furthered by two of the most surprising and successful forgeries in 
all history. These famous documents are known as the Donation of Constantine 
and the False Decretals. The probable object of the former was to justify the 
donation of Pippin (sec. 73) by providing evidence of a similar and earlier donation 
by the first imperial patron of the Church. It " tells how Constantine the Great, 
cured of his leprosy by the prayers of Sylvester, resolved ... to forsake the ancient 
seat for a new capital on the Bosporus, lest the continuance of the secular govern- 
ment should cramp the freedom of the spiritual, and how he bestowed therewith 
upon the Pope and his successors the sovereignty over Italy and the countries of the 
West." — Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire,^. 100. 

The so-called Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, which appeared about the middle of the 
ninth century, tended to a similar end as did the Donation of Constantine, although 
they were originally put out in the interest of the bishops and not of the Pope. 
They formed part of a collection of Church documents, and included many alleged 
letters and edicts of the early popes. Granting their genuineness, they went to prove 
that the bishops of Rome in the second and third centuries exercised all that 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 33 

Such in broad outline was the way in which grew up the Papacy, 
an institution which, far beyond all others, was destined to mold 
the fortunes and direct the activities of Western Christendom 
throughout the mediaeval time. 

Selections from the Sources. — Bede, Ecclesiastical History. Read bk. i, 
chaps, xxiii-xxv ; bk. ii, chaps, i and xiii ; bk. iii, chaps, iii and xxv. Trans- 
lations and Reprints, vol. ii, No. 7, " Life of St. Columban " (ed. by Dana 
Carleton Munro) ; an instructive biography of an Irish monk. Henderson, 
Select Historical Documents, pp. 274-314, " Tne Rule of Saint Benedict." 
European History Studies (Univ. of Nebraska), vol. ii, No. 6, " Monasti- 
cism." Athanasius, Life of St. Antony ; to be found in literal translation 
in KiNGSLEY, The Hermits. See also Robinson, Readings in European 
History, vol. i, chap. v. 

Secondary Works. — Zimmer, The Irish Element in Mediceval Culture; 
an interesting account of the services rendered mediaeval civilization by the 
Irish monks. Kingsley, The Hermits. Montalembert, The Monks of 
the West; an ardent eulogy of monasticism. Wishart, A Short History 
of Monks and Monasteries ; the best short account in English. Putnam, 
Books and their Makers during the Middle Ages, vol. i ; for the labors of 
the monks as copyists and illuminators. Jessopp, The Coming of the 
Friars, chap, iii, "Daily Life in a Mediaeval Monastery." Hatch, The 
Organization of the Early Christian Church; the best work on the subject 
from the Protestant side. Fisher, History of the Christian Church, the 
earlier chapters ; concise, fair, and scholarly. Emerton, Introduction to 
the Study of the Middle Ages, chap, ix, "The Rise of the Christian Church," 
and chap, xi, " The Monks of the West." Barry, The Papal Monarchy, 
chaps, i-v. Adams, Civilization during the Middle Ages, chap, vi, " The 
Formation of the Papacy." Cardinal Gibbons, The Faith of our Fathers, 
chap, ix, "The Primacy of Peter," and chap, x, "The Supremacy of the 
Popes "; an authoritative statement of the Catholic view of these matters. 
Munro and Sellery, Mediceval Civilization, pp. 60-86 and 114-158. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Conversion of the Angles and Saxons. 
2. The Life of St. Antony. 3. St. Columba and lona. 4. Whitby. 5. St. 
Benedict and Monte Cassino. 6. The scriptorium of the monastery. 

authority and extensive jurisdiction which were now being claimed by the popes 
of the ninth centuiy. 

In that uncritical age the documents were received by everybody as authentic. 
The papal party quoted them in part proof of their claims for the Roman see. They 
are now acknowledged by all scholars, Catholic as well as Protestant, to have been 
forged. Laurentius Valla (1406-145 7), one of the greatest of the humanists (sec. 300), 
was the first to demonstrate the real character of the Donation of Constantine. 



CHAPTER IV 
THE FUSION OF LATIN AND TEUTON 

42. Introductory. — The conversion of the barbarians and the 
development in Western Christendom of the central authority of 
the Papacy prepared the way for the introduction among the 
northern races of the arts and the culture of Rome, and contrib- 
uted greatly to hasten in Italy, Spain, and Gaul the fusion into a 
single people of the Latins and the Teutons, of which important 
matter we shall treat in the present chapter. We shall tell how 
these two races, upon the soil of the old Empire in the West, 
intermingled their blood, their languages, their laws, their usages 
and customs, to form new peoples, new tongues, and new institu- 
tions. We shall speak of only a few things and say only just 
enough to show how composite is the character of the structure 
that was reared on the site of the ancient Empire, out of the 
ruins of the broken-down civilization of Rome and the new 
contributions of the northern peoples. 

43. The Romance Nations In some districts the barbarian 

invaders and the Roman provincials were kept apart for a long 
time by the bitter antagonism of race, and by a sense of injury 
on the one hand and a feeling of disdainful superiority on the 
other. But for the most part the Teutonic intruders and the 
Latin-speaking inhabitants of Italy, Spain, and France very soon 
began freely to mingle their blood by family alliances. 

It is quite impossible to say what proportion the Teutons bore 
to the Romans. Of course the proportion varied in the different 
countries. In none of the countries named, however, was it large 
enough to absorb the Latinized population ; on the contrary, the 
barbarians were themselves absorbed, yet not without changing 
very essentially the body into which they were incorporated. 

34 



FORMATION OF THE ROMANCE LANGUAGES 35 

Thus about the end of the fourth century everything in Italy, 
Spain, and France — dwellings, cities, dress, customs, language, 
laws, soldiers — reminds us of Rome. A little later and a great 
change has taken place. The barbarians have come in. For a 
time we see everywhere, jostling each other in the streets and 
markets, crowding each other in the theaters and courts, kneel- 
ing together in the churches, the former Romanized subjects of 
the Empire and their uncouth Teutonic conquerors. But by the 
close of the ninth century, to speak in very general terms, the 
two elements have become quite intimately blended, and a cen- 
tury or two later Roman and Teuton have alike disappeared, and 
we are introduced to Italians, Spaniards, and Frenchmen. These 
we call Romance nations, because at base they are Roman. 

44. The Formation of the Romance Languages. — During the 
five centuries of their subjection to Rome, the natives of Spain 
and Gaul forgot their barbarous dialects and came to speak a cor- 
rupt Latin. Now, in exactly the same way that the dialects of 
the Celtic tribes of Gaul and of the Celtiberians of Spain had 
given way to the more refined speech of the Romans did the 
rude languages of the Teutons yield to the more cultured speech 
of the Roman provincials. In the course of two or three centu- 
ries after their entrance into the Empire, Goths, Lombards, 
Burgundians, and Franks had, in a large measure, dropped 
their own tongue and were speaking that of the people they had 
subjected. 

But of course this provincial Latin underwent a great change 
upon the hps of the mixed descendants of the Romans and 
Teutons. Owing to the absence of a common popular literature, 
the changes that took place in one country did not exactly corre- 
spond to those going on in another. Hence, in the course of 
time, we find different dialects springing up, and by about the 
ninth century the Latin has virtually disappeared as a spoken 
language, and its place has been usurped by what will be known 
as the Italian, Spanish, and French languages, all more or less 
resembling the ancient Latin, and all called Romance tongues, 
because children of the old Roman speech. 



36 THE FUSION OF LATIN AND TEUTON 

45. Consequences of the Coniusion of Languages. — We are now in 
a position to discern one of the causes that helped to render denser 
that dark pall of ignorance which, settling over Western Europe in 
the fifth century, continued almost unrelieved until the eleventh. 

As the provincial Latin began to change, the language in 
which the books were written and the everyday speech began 
to diverge. Thus the manuscript rolls which held the wisdom 
of the Greeks and Romans soon became sealed to all save the 
learned. In this way the confusion of tongues conspired with 
the general confusion and anarchy of the times to extinguish the 
last rays of science and philosophy, and to deepen the gloom of 
the night that had settled upon all the lands once illumined by 
ancient learning and culture. Several centuries had necessarily 
to pass before the new languages forming could develop each a 
literature of its own (sec. 275). Meanwhile all learning was shut 
up within the walls of the monasteries. "For many centuries," 
says Hallam, " to sum up the account of ignorance in a word, it 
was rare for a layman, of whatever rank, to know how to sign his 
name." Charlemagne, king of the Franks, the most renowned 
personage of the five centuries immediately following the fall of 
Rome, was unable to write (sec. 76). 

46. The Personal Character of the Teutonic Laws. — The laws 
of the barbarians were generally personal instead of territorial, as 
with us ; that is, instead of all the inhabitants of a given country 
being subject to the same laws, there were different ones for the 
different classes of society. The Latins, for instance, were sub- 
ject in private law only to the old Roman code, while the Teutons 
lived under the tribal rules and regulations which they had 
brought with them from beyond the Rhine and the Danube. 
The curious state of things resulting from this personality of law, 
as it is called, is vividly pictured by the following observation of 
a chronicler: "For it would often happen," he says, "that five 
men would be sitting or walking together, not one of whom would 
have the same law with any other." 

Even among themselves the Teutons knew nothing of the 
modern legal maxim that all should stand equal before the law. 



ORDEALS 



37 



The penalty inflicted upon the evil doer depended not upon the 
nature of his crime but upon his rank or that of the party injured. 
Thus slaves and serfs were beaten and put to death for minor 
offenses, while a freeman might atone for any crime, even for 
murder, by the payment of a fine, the amount of the penalty 
being determined by the rank of the victim. 

47. Ordeals. — The agencies r'elied upon by the Germans to 
ascertain the guilt or innocence of accused persons show in how 
rude a state the administration of justice among them was. One 
very common method of proof was by what were called ordeals, 
in which the question was submitted to the judgment of God. 
Of these the chief were the ordeal by fire, the ordeal by water ^ 
and the wager of battle} 

The ordeal by fire consisted in taking in the hand a piece of 
red-hot iron, or in walking blindfolded with bare feet over a row 
of hot plowshares laid lengthwise at irregular distances. If the per- 
son escaped unharmed, his innocence was held to be established. 

Another way of performing the fire ordeal was by running 
through the flames of two fires built close together, or by walking 
over live brands ; hence the phrase " to haul over the coals." 

The ordeal by water was of two kinds, by hot water and by 
cold. In the hot-water ordeal the accused person thrust his arm 
into boiling water, and if no- hurt was visible upon the arm three 
days after the operation, the party was considered guiltless. When 
we speak of one's being ''in hot water," we use an expression 
which had its origin in this ordeal. 

In the cold-water trial the suspected person was thrown into 
a stream or pond : if he floated, he was held guilty ; if he sank, 
innocent. The water, it was believed, would reject the guilty, 
but receive the innocent into its bosom. The practice common 
in Europe until a very recent date of trying supposed witches by 
throwing them into a pond of water to see whether they would 
sink or float, grew out of this superstition. 

1 The wager of battle is by some writers treated as a distinct form of trial ; but 
being an appeal to the decision of Heaven, it rested on the same principle as the trials 
by fire and water, and consequently is properly given a place among the ordeals. 



38 



THE FUSION OF LATIN AND TEUTON 



The trial by combat, or wager of battle, was a solemn judicial 
duel. It was resorted to in the belief that God would give vic- 
tory to the right. One circumstance that caused this form oF the 
ordeal to be often invoked was the misuse of the kind of trial 
known as compurgation, or the wager of law.^ This allowed a 
person accused of a crime to clear himself by simply swearing 
that he was innocent, provided he could get a sufficient number 

of his relatives or 
neighbors to swear 
that he was telling 
the truth.^ The num- 
ber of concurring wit- 
nesses was depend- 
ent upon the serious- 
ness of the charge or 
the rank of the per- 
son making the oath. 
Now, this privilege 
was liable to abuse, 
and the only resort 
left to the injured 
person in such case 
was to challenge the 
perjurer to submit to 
the judgment of God 
as it should be pro- 
nounced in a solemn 
judicial combat. This form of trial grew into great favor. 
Naturally it was a favorite mode of trial among a people who 
found their chief delight in fighting. Even the judge in some 
cases resorted to it to maintain the authority and dignity of his 
court. To a person who had disregarded a summons the judge 

2 The wager of law is not to be reckoned among the ordeals, as it lacked the 
essential element of an ordeal, namely, the appeal to the judgment of Heaven. 

3 In course of time this form of the oath was changed, so that the compurgators, 
as the witnesses were called, simply swore that they believed the oath of the accused 
to be true and clean. 




Fig. 8. — Trial by Combat. (From a manuscript 
of the fifteenth century ; after Lacroix) 



ORDEALS 



39 



would send a challenge in this form : " I sent for thee, and thou 
didst not think it worth thy while to come ; I demand therefore 
satisfaction for this thy contempt." Religious disputes also were 
sometimes settled by this sort of " martial logic." In Spain as late 
as the eleventh century a contention as to which of two liturgies 
should be adopted was decided by a combat between two knights. 
The ordeal was frequently performed by deputy, that is, one 
person for hire or for the sake of friendship would undertake it for 
another; hence the ex- 
pression "to go through 
fire and water to serve 
one." Especially was 
such substitution com- 
mon in the judicial duel, 
as women and ecclesias- 
tics were generally forbid- 
den to appear personally 
in the lists. There are 
instances mentioned, 
however, where even 
women performed the 
wager of battle; in which 
case, to equalize the con- 
ditions, the man was 
placed in a pit waist-deep, with his left hand tied behind his back. 
The champions, as the deputies were called, became in time 
a regular class in society, like the gladiators in ancient Rome. 
Religious houses and chartered towns hired champions at a regular 
salary to defend all the cases to which they might become a party. 
In order that the champion might be stimulated to do his best for 
the party he represented, he was hanged or suffered the loss of a 
hand or a foot if he allowed himself to be worsted in a combat.* 

4 There were many other forms of the ordeal, besides those we have given, in use 
among the different Teutonic tribes, some of which were plainly native customs, 
while others seem to have been introduced by the Christian priests. Thus, there 
was the ordeal by consecrated bread ; if the morsel strangled the person, he was ' 
adjudged guilty. From this form of trial arose the expression, " May this morsel 




Fig. 9. — Wager of Battle between a 
Man and Woman. (From a manuscript 
of the fifteenth century ; after Lea, Super- 
stition and Force) 



40 THE FUSION OF LATIN AND TEUTON 

48. The Revival of the Roman Law. — Now, the barbarian law 
system, if such it can be called, the character of which we have 
merely suggested by the preceding illustrations, gradually dis- 
placed the Roman law in all those countries where the two sys- 
tems at first existed alongside each other, save in Italy and 
Southern France, where the provincials greatly outnumbered the 
invaders. But the admirable jurisprudence of Rome was bound 
to assert its superiority. About the close of the eleventh century 
there was a great revival in 'the study of the Roman law as 
embodied in the Justinian code, and in the course of a century 
or two this became either the groundwork or a strong modifying 
element in the law systems of almost all the peoples of Europe. 

What took place may be illustrated by reference to the fate 
of the Teutonic languages in Gaul, Italy, and Spain. As the 
barbarian tongues, after maintaining a place in those countries 
for two or three centuries, at length gave place to the superior 
Latin, which became the basis of the new Romance languages, 
so now in the domain of law the barbarian maxims and customs, 
though holding their place more persistently, likewise finally give 
way, almost everywhere and in a greater or less degree, to the 
more excellent law system of the Empire. Rome must fulfill her 
destiny and give laws to the nations. 

Though longer delayed in their adoption, the law maxims and 
principles of the Empire at length became more widely spread 
and influential than the Latin speech ; for Germany, which never 
gave up her Teutonic tongue, finally adopted the Roman law 
system, to the degree of making its principles the basis of her 
jurisprudence. And even England, though she clung tenaciously 
to her Teutonic customs and maxims, just as she held on to her 
own Teutonic speech, could not escape the influence of the 

be my last." In what was called the ordeal of the bier the person charged with 
murder was made to touch the body of the dead man ; if the body stirred or blood 
flowed afresh from the wound, the man was held guilty of the murder. 

Such ordeals are found among all primitive peoples. For proof by ordeal among 
the Hebrews, see Numbers v. 11-31 and Joshua vii. 16-18. The combat between 
David and Goliath, being an appeal to the judgment of Heaven, possesses the 
essential element of the judicial dueL We also find an ordeal in the test proposed 
by Elijah to the prophets of Baal, — i Kings xviii. 17-40. 



REVIVAL OF THE ROMAN LAW 41 

Roman jurisprudence, which penetrated there, and, to a certain 
extent, chiefly through the courts of the Church, modified English 
law, just as the Latin in an indirect way finally modified and 
enriched the English speech, while leaving it the same in ground- 
work and structure. " Our laws," says Lord Bacon, " are mixed 
as our language ; and as our language is so much the richer, the 
laws are the more complete." 

Under the influence of the classical revival, the various ordeals, 
which were already disappearing before the growing enlightenment 
of the age and the steady opposition of the papal authority, rap- 
idly gave way to modes of trial more consonant with reason and 
the spirit of the civil law. 



Selections from the Sources. — Henderson, Select Historical Docu- 
ments, pp. 176-189, "The SaHc Law," and pp. 314-319, ^^ Formulcs Litur- 
gicce in Use at Ordeals." Lee, Source-Book, chap, v, " Anglo-Saxon Laws." 
Translations and Reprints, vol. iv, No, 4, " Ordeals," etc. (ed. by Arthur 
C. Howland). 

Secondary Works. — Emerton, Introduction to the Middle Ages, chap, 
viii, "Germanic Ideas of Law." Lea, Superstition and Force : Essays on 
the Wager of Law, the Wager of Battle, the Ordeal and Torture. Invaluable 
to the student of primitive culture. Munro and Sellery, Mediceval Civ- 
ilization, pp. 310-325. Hadley, Introduction to Roman Law, Lect. ii, " The 
Roman Law since Justinian." 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The formation of the Romance lan- 
guages. 2. Weregild, 3. Ordeals. 4. The influence of the Roman law 
upon the law systems of Europe. 



CHAPTER V 
THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE EAST 

49. The Era of Justinian (a.d. 527-565). — During the fifty 
years immediately following the fall of Rome, the Eastern em- 
perors struggled hard and sometimes doubtfully to withstand the 
waves of the barbarian inundation which constantly threatened to 
overwhelm Constantinople with the same awful calamities that had 
befallen the imperial city of the West. Had the New Rome — the 
destined refuge for a thousand years of Graeco-Roman learning and 
culture — also gone down at this time before the storm, the loss to 
the cause of civilization would have been incalculable. 

Fortunately, in the year 527, there ascended the Eastern throne 
a prince of unusual ability, to whom fortune gave a general of such 
rare genius that his name has been allotted a place in the short list 
of the great commanders of the world. Justinian was the name of 
the prince, and Belisarius that of the soldier. The sovereign has 
given name to the period, which is called after him the " Era of 
Justinian." 

50. Justinian as the Restorer of the Empire and " The Lawgiver 
of Civilization " ; Calamities of his Reign. — One of the most 
important matters in the reign of Justinian is what is termed the 
*' Imperial Restoration," by which is meant the recovery from the 
barbarians of several of the provinces of the West upon which 
they had seized. Africa, as we have seen (sec. 11), was first 
wrested from the Vandals. Italy was next recovered from the 
Goths and again made a part of the Roman Empire (a.d. 553). 
It was governed from Ravenna by an imperial officer who bore 
the title of Exarch. Besides recovering Africa and Italy from 
the barbarians, Justinian also reconquered from the Visigoths the 
southeastern part of Spain. 

42 



REIGN OF JUSTINIAN 



43 



But that which gives Justinian's reign a greater distinction than 
any conferred upon it by the achievements of his generals was 
the collection and publication by him of the Corpus Juris Civilis, 
the '' Body of the Roman Law." This work embodied all the law 
knowledge of the ancient Romans, and was the most precious 
legacy of Rome to the world.^ In causing its publication Justinian 
earned the title of "The Lawgiver of Civilization." 

Although the reign of Justinian was in many respects auspicious 
and brilliant, still it was for the Empire a time of almost unpar- 
alleled woes and sufferings. Among the calamitous events of the 




. Imperial Possessions at Opening of Reign 
Lands reconquered from the Barbarians 



The Roman Empire under Justinian 

period a prominent place must be given the seditions at Constan- 
tinople and the attendant destruction of property and loss of life. 
The parties or factions indulging in these disorders rose out of the 
chariot races of the circus. These games possessed a strange and 
fatal fascination for the populace of the capital, such as the glad- 
iatorial spectacles had had for the debased multitudes of Old 
Rome. The people became divided into two leading factions, 
known as the Blues and the Greens. These factions carried their 
rivalries into all the relations of life, political and religious. Often 
they indulged in unseemly disturbances in the circus, even in the 
presence of the Emperor himself. In the year 532 there broke 
out what is known as the " Nika " riot, during which a large part 
1 See Ancient History, sec. 577. 



44 



THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE EAST 



of the city was reduced to ashes. The mob was finally enticed 
within the Hippodrome, where it was set upon by the soldiers of 
BeHsarius and thirty- five thousand of the rioters were slain. 

In the year 542, an aw^ul pestilence, bred probably in Egypt, 
fell upon the Empire and did not wholly cease its ravages until 
about fifty years later. This plague was the most terrible scourge 
of which history has any knowledge, save perhaps the so-called 
Black Death, which afilicted Europe in the fourteenth century 
(sec. 217). It is beheved to have carried off one third of the 
population of the Empire. 

51. The Reign of Heraclius (a.d. 610-641). — For half a cen- 
tury after the death of Justinian the annals of the Eastern Roman 
Empire are unimportant. Then we reach the reign of Heraclius, 
a prince about whose worthy name gather matters of significance 
in world history. 

About this time Chosroes II, king of Persia, wrested from the 
hands of the Eastern emperors the fortified cities that guarded 
the Euphratean frontier and overran all Syria, Egypt, and Asia 
Minor. For many years Heraclius battled heroically for the 
integrity of the Empire. The struggle between the two rivals was at 
last decided by a terrible combat known as the battle of Nineveh 
(a.d. 627). The Persian army was almost annihilated. Grief or 
violence ended the life of Chosroes. With his successor, Heraclius 
negotiated a treaty which restored the earlier boundaries of the 
Roman dominions. 

A few years after this the Arabs, of whom we shall tell in the 
following chapter, entered upon their surprising career of conquest, 
which in a short time completely changed the face of the entire 
East. Heraclius himself lived to see — so cruel are the vicissi- 
tudes of fortune — the very provinces which he had recovered 
from the fire worshipers in the possession of the followers of the 
Arabian Prophet. 

The conquests of the Arabs cut off from the Empire those prov- 
inces that had the smallest Greek element, and thus rendered 
the population subject to the Emperor more homogeneous, more 
thoroughly Greek. The Roman element disappeared, and though 



ITS CONTRIBUTIONS TO CIVILIZATION 45 

the government still retained the imperial character impressed 
upon it by the conquerors of the world, the court of Constantinople 
became Greek in tone, spirit, and manners. Hence, instead 
of longer applying to the Empire the designation Roman, many 
historians from this on call it the Greek or Byzantine Empire. 

52 . Services rendered European Civilization by the Roman Em- 
pire in the East.^ — The later Roman Empire rendered such emi- 
nent services to the European world that it justly deserves an* 
important place in universal history. First, as a military outpost 
it held the Eastern frontier of European civiHzation for a thousand 
years against Asiatic barbarism. 

Second, it was the keeper for centuries of the treasures of 
ancient civilization and the instructress of the new Western 
nations in law, in government and administration, in hterature, 
in painting, in architecture, and in the industrial arts. 

Third, it kept alive the imperial idea and principle, and gave 
this fruitful idea and this molding principle back to the West in 
the time of Charlemagne. Without the later Roman Empire 
of the East there would never have been a Romano-German 
Empire of the West (sec. 75). 

Fourth, it was the teacher of religion and civilization to the Slavic 
races of Eastern Europe. Russia forms part of the civilized world 
to-day largely by virtue of what she received from New Rome. 

Secondary Works. —Gibbon, chaps, xl-xliv; on the reign of Justinian. 
Chap, xliv deals with Roman jurisprudence. Oman, The Story of the 
Byzantine Empire, chaps, iv-xi. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, vol. 
iv, " The Imperial Restoration." Rawlinson, The Seventh Great Oriental 
Monarchy, chap. xxiv. Encyc. Brit., article on Justinian by James Bryce. 
Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire ; a work of superior scholarship. 
Bemont and Monod, Mediceval Europe, chap. viii. Harrison, Byzantine 
History in the Early Middle Ages; a brilliant lecture, which summarizes the 
results of the latest studies in the field indicated. Munro and Sellery, 
Mediceval Civilization, pp. 87-113 and 212-223. 

Topics for Class Reports.— i. The recovery of Italy. 2. Belisarius. 
3. Introduction into Europe of the silk industry. 4. Justinian as a builder. 
5. The Code of Justinian. 6, The closing by Justinian of the schools of 
Athens. 

2 Bury's History of the Later Roman Empire, vol. ii, chap, xiv- 



CHAPTER VI 
THE RISE OF ISLAM 

53. The Attack from the South upon Ancient Civilization. — 

We have seen the German barbarians of the North descend upon 
and wrest from the Roman Empire all its provinces in the West. 
We are now to watch a similar attack made upon the Empire by 
the Arabs of the South, and to see wrested from the emperors of the 
East a large part of the lands still remaining under their rule.^ 

54. Origin and Character of the Arabs. — The Arabs, who are 
now about to play their surprising part in history, are, after the 
Hebrews and the Phoenicians, the most important people of the 
Semitic race. The name Saracen, applied to them, is of doubt- 
ful origin, but seems to come from two Arabic words meaning 
"children of the desert." They are divided into two distinct 
classes, — dwellers in towns and dwellers in tents. It is to the 
latter class alone that the term Bedouins is properly applied. 
The virtues which these nomad Arabs most highly prize are 
hospitality, generosity, and fidelity to the ties of kinship. 

Secure in their inaccessible deserts, the Arabs have never as a 
nation bowed their necks to a foreign conqueror, although por- 
tions of the Arabian peninsula have been repeatedly subjugated 
by different invaders. 

55. The Religious Condition of Arabia before Mohammed. — 
Religion, which had had nothing to do with the fateful move- 
ment among the German barbarians, was the inciting cause of 
the great Arabian revolution. 

Before the reforms of Mohammed the Arabs were idolaters. 
Their holy city was Mecca. Here was the ancient and most 
revered shrine of the Kaaba,^ where was preserved a sacred black 

1 The student should make a careful study of the maps after pp. 8 and 52. 

2 So named from its having the shape of a cube. 

46 



THE RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF ARABIA 47 

stone that was believed to have been given by an angel to 
Abraham. To this Meccan shrine pilgrimages were made from 
the most remote parts of Arabia. 

But though polytheism was the prevailing religion of Arabia, 
still there were in the land many followers of other faiths. The 
Jews especially were to be found in some parts of the peninsula 
m great numbers, having been driven from Palestine by the 
Roman persecutions. From them the Arab teachers had been 
made acquainted with the doctrine of one sole God. From the 



^k^^MM^ hc\mM^\^mm 




Fig. 10. — The Kaaba at Mecca 

numerous Christian converts dwelling among them they had 
learned something of the doctrines of Christianity. In view of 
these antecedents of the religion which Mohammed gave his 
people, his creed appears to some scholars to be essentially 
"Judaism as adapted to Arabia," while to others it presents itself 
as an heretical or modified form of Christianity. 

About the time to which we have now come there was much 
religious unrest in Arabia. As it was in Judea at the time of the 
appearance of Christ, so was it now in this southern land. There 
were here many seekers after God, — men who, dissatisfied with 
the old idolatry, were ready to embrace a higher faith. 



48 THE RISE OF ISLAM 

Such was the rehgious condition of the tribes of Arabia about 
the beginning of the seventh century of our era when there 
appeared among them a Prophet under whose teachings the fol- 
lowers of all the idolatrous worships were led to give assent to a 
single and simple creed, and were animated by a fanatical enthu- 
siasm that drove them forth from their deserts upon a career of 
conquest which could not be stayed until they had overrun the 
fairest portions of the Roman and Persian empires, and given 
a new religion to a large part of the human race. 

56. Mohammed. — Mohammed, the great Prophet of the 
Arabs, was born in the holy city of Mecca, probably in the year 
A.D. 570. He sprang from the distinguished tribe of the Koreish, 
the custodians of the sacred shrine of the Kaaba. In his early 
years he was a shepherd and a watcher of flocks by night, as the 
great religious teachers Moses and David had been before him. 
Later he became a merchant and a camel driver. 

Mohammed possessed a soul that was early and deeply stirred 
by the contemplation of those themes that ever attract the reli- 
gious mind. He declared that he had visions in which the angel 
Gabriel appeared to him and made to him revelations which he 
was commanded to make known to his fellow-men. The starting 
point of the new faith which he was to teach was this : There is 
but one God, and Mohammed is his Prophet. 

For a long time Mohammed endeavored to gain adherents 
merely by persuasion ; but such was the incredulity which he 
everywhere met that at the end of three years his disciples 
numbered only forty persons. 

57. The Hegira (a.d. 622). — The teachings of Mohammed at 
last aroused the anger of a powerful party among the Koreish, who 
feared that they as the guardians of the national idols of the Kaaba 
would be compromised in the eyes of the other tribes by allowing 
such heresy to be openly taught by one of their number, and accord- 
ingly they began to persecute Mohammed and his follo\i^ers. 

To escape these persecutions Mohammed fled to the neighbor- 
ing city of Medina. This Hegira^ or Flight, as the word signifies, 
occurred a.d. 622, and was considered by the Moslems as such 



MOHAMMED AT MEDINA 40 

an important event in the history of their religion that they 
adopted it as the beginning of a new era, and from it still con- 
tinue to reckon historical dates. 

58. Mohammed at Medina. — At this time Medina was merely 
a cluster of clan villages on an oasis of the desert. Bitter feuds 
divided the clans, and the community was in a state of genuine 
Arab anarchy. Mohammed at once assumed the functions of an 
arbiter and lawgiver. He framed for the community a remark- 
able charter or constitution, which united the warring clans into 
a little commonwealth, — the nucleus of the great Arabian Empire. 
His government was a theocracy, like that of ancient Israel. 
Mohammed was not now, as while at Mecca, simply a prophet, 
but a legislator, judge, and king. It is only by bearing in mind 
his changed position that we shall understand his work and acts 
at Medina and be enabled to judge them justly. 

As prophet, Mohammed continued to make known the reve- 
lations that came to him. A large part of the Koran, but not 
the part of loftiest religious feeling, was given at Medina. In the 
Httle rude mosque which he had caused to be built as a place of 
devotion and assemblage, the apostle preached to the people and 
led them in the service of prayer. In this service he made an 
innovation of the greatest significance. At first he had enjoined 
upon his followers in praying to turn, as did the Jews, towards 
Jerusalem, but failing in his efforts to win over this people, of 
whom there was a large number settled in the suburbs of Medina, 
and to persuade them to recognize him as a true prophet, he 
broke with them, and commanded his disciples in praying to 
turn towards Mecca. This meant that the attempt to eifect a 
fusion of Judaism and Islam had failed, and that Islam was to 
run its course as a distinct rehgion. 

As lawgiver and judge, Mohammed decided the various cases, 
civil and rehgious, brought to him. The decisions rendered by 
him and the precedents he set form the chief basis of the law 
system of the Moslem world to-day. 

As chief or king, Mohammed, like his prototype David, planned 
and led border raids and military campaigns. The year after the 



so 



THE RISE OF ISLAM 



Hegira he sent out an expedition to intercept a caravan of the 
Koreish and to make it a prize. This was in strict accord with 
Arab rule and custom, for the Koreish in expelling Mohammed 
from Mecca and in attempting to kill him had established a state 
of war between him and themselves. This marauding soon led to 
a pitched battle (the so-called battle of Bedr, a.d. 624) between 
the Meccans and the followers of Mohammed, which resulted 
in a signal victory for the Moslems. This was the beginning 
of the holy wars of Islam.^ 

59. Capture of Mecca; Arabia acknowledges Mohammed as a 
true Prophet. — In the tenth year of the Hegira, the Meccans 
having violated a truce which they had entered into with the 
new state at Medina, Mohammed at the head of an army of ten 
thousand Bedouins marched against Mecca and captured the city 
almost without a blow. The Prophet dealt most magnanimously 
with his former persecutors. Only a very few were proscribed. It 
was the idols alone in the place that were given over to destruc- 
tion. Entering the Kaaba, Mohammed exclaimed, "Truth has 
come and error has fled away." He then ordered that all the 
idols there should be hewn down. 

The capture of Mecca constitutes a great landmark in the 
career of Islam. The Arabian tribes now almost unanimously 
turned to Mohammed as a true Prophet. During the year fol- 
lowing the fall of Mecca so many embassies of submission came 
to him that this is called the " Year of Deputations." The once 
rejected Prophet had become the spiritual and military head of 
the innumerable Arab clans, whom the intense ardor of religious 
enthusiasm had welded into a mighty brotherhood and nation. 
There is nothing outside the realm of miracles more wonderful 
than this quick triumph of Islam over the Arab race and the 
change wrought in them by the force of a great conviction.* 

3 Mohammed about this time gave his followers the following revelation, which 
had great influence in securing for early Islam its remarkable military successes: 
" And those who are slain in God's cause, their works shall not go wrong ; He . . . 
will make them enter into Paradise which He has told them of." — The Koran, 
sura xlvii, 5 (Palmer's trans.). 

4 Without doubt, as is maintained by many, the Arab's love of warfare and hope 
of plunder had much to do in bringing about this amazing revolution ; but, as in the 



THE ORIGIN OF THE KORAN 51 

In the founding of the Moslem state, Mohammed without 
doubt was guilty of many cruel and unjust acts; but it is also 
equally certain that the establishrnent of his empire was attended 
by less injustice and cruelty than marks the establishment of any 
other Asiatic state known to history, — from the Kingdom of Israel 
in Palestine to the British Empire in India. 

In the tenth year of the Hegira Mohammed made a farewell 
pilgrimage to Mecca. He there spoke to a vast throng of forty 
thousand pilgrims, closing what he felt to be his last pubHc 
address with these words : " O Lord, I have delivered my mes- 
sage and fulfilled my mission." A few months later he died, and 
was buried at Medina, and his tomb there is to-day a most sacred 
place of pilgrimage for the Moslem world. 

60. The Origin of the Koran. — Before going on to trace the 
conquests of the successors of Mohammed, we must try to form 
some idea of the religion of the great Prophet. 

The doctrines of Mohammedanism, or Islam, which means 
"submission to God," are contained in the Koran, which is 
believed by the orthodox to have been written from all eternity 
on tablets in heaven. From time to time the apostle recited^ 
to his disciples portions of the "heavenly book" as its contents 
were revealed to him in his dreams and visions. These com- 
munications were held in the "breasts of men," or were written 
down upon bones, pieces of pottery, and the ribs of palm leaves. 
Soon after the death of the Prophet these scraps of writing 
were religiously collected, supplemented by tradition, and then 
arranged chiefly according to length. Thus came into existence 
the sacred book of Islam. 

61. The Teachings of the Koran The fundamental doctrine 

of the creed embodied in the Koran is the unity of God : " There 
is no God save Allah" echoes through the book. To this is 
added the equally binding declaration that " Mohammed is the 
Prophet of Allah." 

case of the later crusading movement in Christendom, we shall not be wrong in 
making religious feeling its chief moving principle. 

5 Palmer in the introduction to his translation of the Koran says that it is 
"probable Mohammed could neither read nor write." 



52 ' THE RISE OF ISLAM 

The Koran inculcates four cardinal virtues. The first of these 
is prayer : five times every day must the believer turn his face 
towards Mecca and engage in devotion. The second requirement 
is almsgiving. The third is keeping the fast of Ramadan, which 
lasts a whole month. The fourth duty is making a pilgrimage 
to Mecca. Every person who can possibly do so is required to 
make this journey. 

To the faithful the Koran promises a heaven filled with every 
sensual delight, with flowers and fruits and bright-eyed maidens 
(houris) of ravishing beauty, and threatens unbelievers and the 
doers of evil with the torments of a hell filled with every horror 
of flame and demon. 

62. The Sunna. — Islam is not based upon the Koran alone. 
It rests in part upon what is known as the Simna^ that is, a great 
body of traditions of the Prophet's sayings, — those not forming 
a part of the sacred book, — his actions, practices, and decisions 
handed down from his immediate companions. The first col- 
lection of these was made in the second century after Moham- 
med's death. These traditions are regarded by the orthodox 
Moslem as being almost as sacred and authoritative as the words 
of the Koran itself. In regard to its significance for the develop- 
ment of Islam, we may compare the Sunna to the body of tra- 
ditions handed down alongside the Bible in the Christian Church, 
and which has so greatly influenced the development particularly 
.of Catholic Christianity. 

63. The Conquest of Persia, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa. — 
For exactly one century after the death of Mohammed the cahphs 
or successors of the Prophet ^ were engaged in an almost unbroken 
series of conquests. Persia was subjugated and the authority of 
the Koran was established throughout the land of the Zend-Avesta. 
Syria was wrested from the Eastern Roman Empire and Asia 
Minor was overrun. Egypt and North Africa, the latter just 

6 Abu Bekr (a.d. 632-634), Mohammed's father-in-law, was the first caliph. He 
was followed by Omar (a.d." 634-644), Othman (a.d. 644-655), and Ali (a.d. 655- 
661), all of whom fell by the hands of assassins, for from the very first dissensions 
were rife among the followers of the Prophet, Ali was the last of the four so-called 
orthodox caliphs. 



TLJ 



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, A -Pisa 



M.( 



'-■■^ Cecily} 









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GREATEST EXTENT 

OF THE 

SARACEJN^ DOMINIONS 

C. A. D. 750 



20 Longitude 25 East 



ATTACKS UPON CONSTANTINOPLE 53 

recently delivered from the Vandals, were also snatched from the 
hands of the Byzantine emperors. 

By the conquest of Persia Zoroastrianism, a religion with a 
great- past, was, as a force in history, destroyed.'^ By the con- 
quest of Syria the birthplace of Christianity was lost to the Chris- 
tian world. By the conquest of North Africa lands whose history 
for a thousand years had been intertwined with that of the oppo- 
site shores of Europe, and which at one time seemed destined to 
share in the career of freedom and progress opening to the peoples 
of that continent, were drawn back into the fatalism and the stag- 
nation of the East. From being an extension of Europe they 
became once more an extension of Asia. 

64. Attacks upon Constantinople. — Thus in only a little more 
than fifty years from the death of Mohammed his standard had 
been carried by the lieutenants of his successors through Asia to 
the Hellespont on the one side and across Africa to the Straits 
of Gibraltar on the other. We may expect to see the Saracens 
at one or both of these points attempt the invasion of Europe. 

The first attempt was made in the East (a.d. 673-677), where 
the Arabs endeavored to gain control of the Bosporus by wrest- 
ing Constantinople from the hands of the Eastern emperors. 
After repeated unsuccessful assaults they abandoned the under- 
taking. Forty years later (a.d. 717—718) the city was again 
invested by a powerful Saracen fleet and army; but the skill 
and personal heroism of the Emperor Leo the Isaurian, the use 
by the besieged of a recently invented combustible compound 
known as mari7ie fire (''Greek fire"), and timely aid from the 
Bulgarians saved the capital for several centuries longer to the 
Christian world. 

This check that the Saracens received before Constantinople 
was doubtless next in importance for European civilization to the 

"^ The number of Guebers or fire worshipers in Persia at the present time is 
about 100,000, found for the most part at Yezd and in the province of Kerman. 
A larger number may be counted in Western India, — the descendants of the Guebers 
who fled from Persia at the time of the Arabian invasion. They are there called 
Parsees, from the land whence they came. After the English, they are the most 
enterprising, intelligent, and influential class in India to-day. 



54 THE RISE OF ISLAM 

check given their conquering hordes a little later in France at 
the great battle of Tours. 

65. The Conquest of Spain (a.d. 711). — While the Moslems 
were thus being repulsed from Europe at its eastern extremity, 
the gates of the continent were opened to them — legend says 
by treachery — at the western, and they gained a foothold in Spain. 
At the great battle of Xeres (a.d. 711) the last of the Visigothic 
kings was hopelessly defeated, and all the peninsula save some 
mountainous regions in the northwest quickly submitted to the 
invaders. By this conquest some of the fairest provinces of Spain 
were lost to Christendom for a period of eight hundred years. 

No sooner had the subjugation of the country been effected 
than multitudes of colonists from Arabia, Syria, and North Africa 
crowded into the peninsula, until in a short time the provinces 
of Seville, Cordova, Toledo, and Granada became predominantly 
Arabic in dress, manners, language, and religion. 

66. Invasion of France; Battle of Tours (a.d. 732). — Four or 
five years after the conquest of Spain the Saracens crossed the 
Pyrenees and established themselves upon the plains of Gaul. 
This advance of the Moslem host beyond the northern wallof 
Spain was viewed with the greatest alarm by all Christendom. It 
looked as though the followers of Mohammed would soon possess 
all the continent. As Draper pictures it, the Crescent, lying in a 
vast semicircle upon the northern shore of Africa and the curving 
coast of Asia, with one horn touching the Bosporus and the 
other the Straits of Gibraltar, seemed about to round to the full 
and overspread all Europe. 

In the year 732, just one hundred years after the death of 
the Prophet, the Franks, under their leader Charles Martel, and 
their allies met the Moslems upon the plains of Tours in the center 
of Gaul and committed to the issue of a single battle the fate of 
Christendom and the future course of history. The Arabs suffered 
an overwhelming defeat and soon withdrew behind the Pyrenees. 

The young Christian civilization of Western Europe was thus 
deHvered from an appalling danger such as had not threatened it 
since the fearful days of Attila and the Huns. 



CHANGES IN THE CALIPHATE 55 

67. Changes in the Caliphate ; its Golden Age at Bagdad 

Only eighteen years after the battle of Tours an important event 
marked the internal history of the caliphate. After the assassi- 
nation of Ali,^ a usurper, Moawiyah by name, was recognized as 
caliph. He succeeded in making the office hereditary instead of 
elective or appointive, as it had been hitherto, and thus estab- 
Hshed what is known as the dynasty of the Ommeiades,^ the 
rulers of which family for nearly a century (a.d. 661-750) issued 
their commands from the city of Damascus. 

The house of the Ommeiades was overthrown by the adherents 
of the house of Ali, who established a new dynasty (a.d. 750), 
known as that of the Abbassides, so called from Abbas, an uncle 
of Mohammed. The new family, soon after coming to power, 
established the seat of the royal residence on the lower Tigris, 
and upon the banks of that river founded the renowned city of 
Bagdad, which was destined to remain the abode of the Abbasside 
caliphs for a period of five hundred years. 

The golden age of the caliphate of Bagdad covered the latter 
part of the eighth and the ninth century of our era, and was illus- 
trated by the reigns of such princes as Al-Mansur (a.d. 754—775) 
and the renowned Harun-al-Raschid (a.d. 786-809). During 
this period science and philosophy and literature were most 
assiduously cultivated by the Arabian scholars, and the court of 
the caliphs presented in culture and luxury a striking contrast 
to the rude and barbarous courts of the kings and princes of 
Western Christendom. 

68. The Dismemberment of the Caliphate. — "At the close of 
the first century of the Hegira," writes Gibbon, " the caliphs 

8 See sec. 63, n. 6. 

9 So called from Omeyyah, an ancestor of Moawiyah. In securing their power 
the Ommeiades had caused the murder of the two sons of Ali, Hassan and Hosain. 
These youths were ever regarded as martyrs by the friends of the house of Ali, and 
the schism caused by their cruel death has never been healed. The Mohammedans 
of Persia, who are known as Shiahs, are the leaders of the party of Ali, while the 
Turks and Arabs, known as Sunnitcs, are the chief adherents of the opposite party. 
These latter take their name from the fact that they hold the Sunna (sec. 62) as 
sacred and authoritative. The Shiahs, on the other hand, reject all these traditions 
of the Prophet save such as can be traced back to Ali or to his immediate posterity. 



56 THE RISE OF ISLAM 

were the most potent and absolute monarchs of the globe. The 
word that went forth from the palace at Damascus was obeyed 
on the Indus, on the Jaxartes, and on. the Tagus." Scarcely less 
potent was the word that at first went forth from Bagdad. But 
in a short time the extended empire, through the quarrels of 
sectaries and the ambitions of rival aspirants for the honors of the 
caliphate, was broken in fragments, and from three capitals — 
from Bagdad upon the Tigris, from Cairo upon the Nile, and 
from Cordova upon the Guadalquivir — were issued the commands 
of three rival caliphs, each of whom was regarded by his adher- 
ents as the sole rightful spiritual and civil successor of Mohammed. 
All, however, held the great Prophet in the same reverence, all 
maintained with equal zeal the sacred character of the Koran, and 
all prayed with their faces turned toward the holy city of Mecca. 

69. The Civilization of Arabian Islam. ^° — The Saracens were 
coheirs of antiquity with the Germans. They made especially 
their own the scientific -^^ accumulations of the ancient civiliza- 
tions and bequeathed them to Christian Europe. These elements 
of civilization they added to and enriched, and in several of the 
countries of which they took possession, especially in Babylonia 
and in Spain, there developed a civilization which in some respects 
far surpassed any that the world had yet seen. 

In the arrangements of their court, the organization of their 
army, and the administration of their government the Arabs 
imitated the Persians or the Byzantine Greeks. Their govern- 
ment was an absolute monarchy, such as has always been the 
favorite form among Oriental peoples. 

The Moslem law system, the basis of which is found in the 
Koran, was the most original creation of the Arab mind. After 
the Roman law, it is probably the most influential and widely 
obeyed system of laws and regulations that any race or civilization 
has developed. Since the system embraces rehgious as well as 
civil matters, it is in some respects like the Mosaic code, from 

10 Kremer's Culturgeschichte des Orients unter den Chalifen, chaps, vii and ix. 

11 Gibbon affirms that no Greek poet, orator, or historian was ever translated 
into Arabic. See Decline and Fall, chap, lii. 



THE CIVILIZATION OF ARABIAN ISLAM 57 

which it freely borrowed. It deals with all kinds of subjects, ran- 
ging from prayer and pilgrimages to contracts and inheritances. 

Commerce and trade, in all the countries of which the Arabs made 
themselves masters, assumed a fresh activity and a new importance. 
The Arabs in Babylonia and Syria became the heirs and succes- 
sors of the ancient Chaldaeans and Phoenicians, and re-created that 
commercial activity of the earlier time that nourished the great 
cities of Babylon, Tyre, and Sidon. As in the Odyssey of Homer 
we have a mirror of the commercial activity and the adventurous 
trade voyages of the early maritime Greeks, so in the marvelous 
stories of Sindbad the Sailor we have a like mirror of the voyages 
and adventures of the Arabian sailors. 

In the lighter forms of literature — romance and poetry — the 
Arabs produced much that possesses a high degree of excellence. 
In the field of romance they followed the Persian story-tellers. 
The inimitable tales of the Arabian Nights, besides being a valu- 
able commentary on Arabian life and manners at the time of the 
culmination of Oriental culture at the court of Bagdad, forms 
also an addition to the imperishable portion of the literature of 
the world. The poetry of the Arabs was wholly original. It was 
the natural and beautiful expression of the Arabian genius. 

The physical sciences were also pursued by the Arabian schol- 
ars with great eagerness and with considerable success. Geography 
was forced upon their attention by their wide conquests and 
their extended trade relations. From the Greeks and the Hindus 
they received the germs of astronomy, geometry, arithmetic, alge- 
bra, medicine, botany, and other sciences. Almost all of the 
sciences that thus came into their hands were improved and 
enriched by them, and then transmitted to European scholars.^^ 
They made medicine for the first time a true science. They devised 

12 What Europe received in science from Arabian sources is kept in remembrance 
by such words as alchemy, alcohol, aletnbic, algebra, alkali, almanac, azimuth, 
chemistry, elixir, zenith, and nadir. To how great an extent the chief Arabian cities 
became the manufacturing centers of the mediasval world is indicated by the names 
which these places have given to various textile fabrics and other articles. Thus 
muslin comes from Mosul, on the Tigris, damask from Damascus, and gauze from 
Gaza. Damascus and Toledo blades tell of the proficiency of the Arab workmen in 
metallurgy. 



58 



THE RISE OF ISLAM 



what is known from them as the Arabic or decimal system of 
notation,^^ and gave to Europe this indispensable instrument of all 
scientific investigations dependent upon mathematical calculations. 
All this literary and scientific activity naturally found expression 
in the estabUshment of schools, universities, and libraries. In all 
the great cities of the Arabian Empire, as at Bagdad, Cairo, and 




Fig. II. — The Mosque of Cordova. (From a photograph) 

Cordova, centuries before Europe could boast anything beyond 
cathedral or monastic schools, great universities were drawing to- 
gether vast crowds of eager young Moslems and creating an atmos- 
phere of learning and refinement. The famous university at Cairo, 
which has at the present day an attendance of several thousand 
students, is a survival from the great days of Arabian Islam. 

In the erection of mosques and other public edifices the Arab 
architects developed a new and striking style of architecture, — 
some cf the most beautiful specimens of which are preserved to 



13 The figures or numerals, with the exception of the zero symbol, employed in 
their system they seem to have borrowed from India. 



THE EVIL AND THE GOOD IN ISLAM 



59 



us at Cordova and Granada in Spain, — a style which has given 
to modern builders some of their finest models. 

70. The Evil and the Good in Islam. — The first-fruits of Islam 
might well lead one to regard it as a faith conducive to culture ; 
but it must be borne in mind that the splendid civilization of 
Bagdad, Cairo, and Cordova was, in great measure at least, a 
reflected glory. The relation of this brilliant culture to that of 
the declining Byzantine and Persian empires has been aptly illus- 
trated by likening it to the clouds which gather about the setting 
sun and are lighted up by it with a splendor not their own. 

In many of its teachings and institutions Islam, in truth, is a 
system unfavorable to social progress. In opposition to Christian- 
ity, it tolerates polygamy ^* and places no restraint upon divorce, 
thus destroying the sacredness of family life. In authorizing the 
faithful to make slaves of their captives in holy wars, it legalizes 
slavery; Mohammedan countries are the main strongholds of 
slavery at the present time. It also fosters religious intolerance ; 
the Moslem is forbidden by his religion to grant equality to unbe- 
lievers. Again, it unites in the same hands both religious and 
civil authority and thereby creates despotism. 

Still another most serious defect of Islam is found in the immu- 
table character of its system of laws. All the enactments and judicial 
decisions of Mohammed and of the first four caliphs are regarded 
as binding, at least in spirit, for all time. Since the system covers 
the civil as well as the religious sphere, Mohammedan law has been 
prevented from adapting itself to the changing needs of society. 
This is doubtless one cause of the unprogressive character of 
Mohammedan society as contrasted with the progressive civiliza- 
tion of the Western races, who were the fortunate inheritors of the 
admirable secular, and therefore flexible, system of the Roman law. 
Islam, however, inculcates some inspiring truths and recom- 
mends some great virtues. Like Christianity it teaches the unity 
of God, immortality, and retributive rewards and punishments 

14 The Koran (sura iv, 3) allows the believer to take " two, or three, or four 
wives, and not more." By a special dispensation (sura xxxiii, 49) Mohammed was 
allowed to take a larger number. At one time the Prophet had ten wives. 



6o THE RISE OF ISLAM 

after death. These doctrines render it immeasurably superior to 
fetichism or to polytheism, and have made it a great force for the 
uplift of multitudes of idolatrous tribes in Asia and Africa. 

Among the leading virtues inculcated by Islam is that of tem- 
perance. The Koran forbids positively to the believer the use of 
wine and inferentially of all strong drinks. To this prohibition is 
attributable the fact that drunkenness is less common and open 
in Mohammedan than in Christian lands. 

Finally, in forming our estimate of Islam we should carefully 
bear in mind that the religion as held and practiced by the dif- 
ferent Mohammedan races to-day, particularly by the Ottoman 
Turks, is a very degenerate form of the Islamic faith when com- 
pared with that held and practiced by the Arabs, the people 
among whom it first arose. Mohammedanism, like Christianity, 
was at its best in what we may call its Apostolic Age. 

Selections from the Sources. — The Koran, like the Bible for Chris- 
tianity, is our chief source for a knowledge of Islam as a religion. The 
translation by Palmer, in Sacred Books of the East, is the best. The 
Speeches a7id Table- Talk of the Prophet Mohami7ied (trans, by Stanley Lane- 
Poole). European History Studies (Univ. of Nebraska), vol. ii. No. 3, 
" Selections from the Koran." 

Secondary Works. — Muir, The Cordn, The Life of Mohammed, Annals 
of the Early Caliphate, and The Rise and Declijie of Islam. All these, 
works are based on the original sources ; they are, however, written in an 
unsympathetic spirit. Smith, Mohammed and Mohamniedanism ; has a 
short bibliography. Irving, Mahomet and his Successors. Gibbon, The 
Decline and Fall, chaps. 1-lii. C arlyle, Heroes and Hero- Worship, Lect. ii, 
" The Hero as Prophet." Freeman, History and Conquests of the Sara- 
cens ; a rapid sketch by a master. Oilman, The Saracens from the Earliest 
Times to the Fall of Bagdad ; contains a list of over two hundred books 
bearing on the subject, Syed Ameer Ali, The Spirit of Islam : or the 
Life and Teachings of Mohammed ; by a Mohammedan barrister at law. 
Also the same author's Short History of the Saracens. PooLE, Studies in 
a Mosque. Smith, The Bible in Islam, chap, x, " Church and State " ; for 
Mohammed's position at Medina. Munro and Sellery, Mediceval Civiliza- 
tion, pp. 224-239. The articles by Wellhausen, Noldeke, and Guyard, under 
the word Mohammedanism in the Encyc. Brit., have a very special value. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Mohammed at Medina. 2. The con- 
quest of Egypt by the Arabs. 3. The caliph Harun-al-Raschid. 4. The 
Arabiafi Nights. 5. The Moors in Spain. 



CHAPTER VII 

CHARLEMAGNE AND THE RESXaRATION OF THE EMPIRE IN 
THE WEST 

71. Introductory. — We return now to the West. The Franks, 
who with the aid of their confederates withstood the advance of 
the Saracens upon the field of Tours and saved Europe from sub- 
jection to the Koran, are the people that first attract our attention. 
Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, their king, is the imposing 
figure that moves amidst all the events of the times, — indeed, is 
the one who makes the events and renders the period an epoch 
in universal history. 

The story of this era aifords the key to very much of the sub- 
sequent history of Western Europe. The mere enumeration of 
the events which are to claim our attention will illustrate the 
important and germinal character of the period. We shall tell 
how the mayors of the palace of the Merovingian princes became 
the actual kings of the Franks ; how, through the Hberality of the 
Frankish kings, the popes laid the foundations of their temporal 
sovereignty; and how Charlemagne restored the Roman Empire 
in the West, and throughout its extended limits, in the fusion of 
things Roman and of things Germanic, laid the basis of modern 
civilization. 

72. How Duke Pippin became King of the Franks (a.d. 751). 

Charles Martel, who saved the Christian civihzation of Western 
Europe on the field of Tours, although the real head of the Frank- 
ish nation, was nominally only an officer of the Merovingian court 
(sec. 12). He died without ever having borne the title of king, 
notwithstanding he had exercised all the authority of that office. 

But Charles' son. Pippin III, aspired to the regal title and 
honors. He resolved to depose his titular master and to make 

61 



62 CHARLEMAGNE 

himself king. Not deeming it wise, however, to do this without 
the sanction of the Pope, he sent an embassy to represent to him 
the state of affairs and to sohcit his advice. Mindful of recent 
favors that he had received at the hands of Pippin, the Pope gave 
his approval to the proposed scheme by replying that it seemed 
altogether reasonable that the one who was king in reality should 
be king also in name. This was sufficient. Childeric — such was 
the name of the Merovingian king — was straightway deposed, 
and Pippin, whose own deeds together with those of his illustri- 
ous father had done so much for the Frankish nation and for 
Christendom, was crowned king of the Franks (a.d. 751), and 
thus became the first of the Carolingian line, the name of his 
illustrious son Charles (Charlemagne) giving name to the house. 

73. Pippin helps to establish the Temporal Power of the Popes 
(a.d. 756). — In the year a.d. 754 Pope Stephen II, troubled by 
the king of the Lombards, besought Pippin's aid against the bar- 
barian. Pippin, quick to return the favor which the head of the 
Church had rendered him in the securing of his crown, straight- 
way interposed in behalf of the Pope. He descended into Italy 
with an army, expelled the Lombards from their recent con- 
quests, and made a donation to the Pope of the regained lands ^ 
(a.d. 756). As a symbol of the gift he laid the keys of Ravenna, 
Rimini, and of many other cities on the tomb of St. Peter. 

This endowment may be regarded as having practically laid 
the basis of the temporal sovereignty of the popes ; for although 
Pope Stephen, as it seems, had already resolved to cast off alle- 
giance to the Eastern Emperor and set up an independent Church 
state, still it is not probable that he could have carried out such 
an enterprise successfully had he not been aided in his project by 
the Frar\kish king. 

74. Accession of Charlemagne ; his Wars. — Pippin died in the 
year 768, and his kingdom passed into the hands of his two sons, 
Carloman and Charles, the latter being better known by the name 
he achieved of Charlemagne, or " Charles the Great." Three years 

1 The sovereignty of all these lands belonged nominally to the Emperor at Con: 
stantinople. His claims were ignored by Pippin. 



ACCESSION OF CHARLEMAGNE 63 

after the accession of the brothers, Carloman died, and Charles 
took possession of his dominions. 

Charlemagne's long reign of nearly half a century — he ruled 
forty-six years — was filled with mihtary expeditions and con- 
quests, by which he so extended the boundaries of his dominions 
that they came to embrace the larger part of Western Europe. 
He made over fifty military campaigns, the chief of which were 
against the Lombards, the Saracens, the Saxons, and the Avars. 

Among the first undertakings of Charlemagne was a campaign 
against the Lombards, whose king, Desiderius, was troubling the 
Pope. Charlemagne wrested from Desiderius all his possessions, 
shut up the unfortunate king in a monastery, and placed on his 
own head the famous " Iron Crown " of the Lombards (sec. 13). 

In the year 778 Charlemagne gathered his warriors for a cru- 
sade against the Mohammedan Moors in Spain. He crossed the 
Pyrenees and succeeded in winning from the Moslems all the 
northeastern corner of the peninsula. These lands thus regained 
for Christendom he made a part of his dominions, under the tide 
of the Spanish March.^ 

But by far the greater number of the campaigns of Charlemagne 
were directed against the still pagan Saxons. These people were 
finally reduced to permanent submission and forced to accept 
Charlemagne as their sovereign and Christianity as their religion. 

To the east and the southeast, behind the German tribes that 
Charlemagne had reduced to obedience, were the Avars, a race 
terrible as the Huns of Attila, and an offshoot seemingly of the 
same stock. In a series of campaigns Charlemagne broke their 
power and reduced the race to a tributary condition. This sub- 
jugation of the Avars was one of the greatest services that he 
rendered the young Christian civilization of Europe. For three 
centuries they had been the scourge of all their neighbors. 

2 As Charles was leading his victorious bands back across the Pyrenees, the rear 
of his army, while hemmed in by the walls of the Pass of Roncesvalles, was set upon 
by the wild mountaineers (the Gascons) and cut to pieces before he could give rehef. 
Of the details of this event no authentic account has been preserved ; but long after- 
wards, associated with the fabulous deeds of the hero Roland, it formed a favorite 
theme of the tales and songs of the Trouveurs of Northern France (sec. 243). 



64 CHARLEMAGNE 

75. Restoration of the Empire in the West (a.d. 800). — An 
event of seemingly little real moment, yet in its influence upon 
succeeding affairs of the very greatest importance, now claims 
our attention. Pope Leo III having called upon Charlemagne 
for aid against a hostile faction at Rome, the king soon appeared 
in person at the capital and punished summarily the disturbers 
of the peace of the Church. The gratitude of Leo led him at 
this time to make a most signal return for the many services of 
the Frankish king. To understand his act a word of explanation 
is needed. 

For a considerable time a variety of circumstances had been 
fostering a growing feeling of enmity between the Italians and 
the emperors at Constantinople. Just at this time, by the crime 
of the Empress Irene, who had deposed her son, Constantine VI, 
and put out his eyes that she might have his place, the Byzantine 
throne was vacant, in the estimation of the Italians, who con- 
tended that the crown of the Caesars could not be worn by a 
woman. In view of these circumstances Pope Leo and those 
about him conceived the purpose of taking away from the hereti- 
cal and effeminate Greeks the imperial crown and bestowing it 
upon some strong and orthodox and worthy prince in the West. 

Now, among all the Teutonic chiefs of Western Christendom 
there was none who could dispute in claims to the honor with the 
king of the Franks, the representative of a most illustrious house 
and the strongest champion of the young Christianity of the West 
against her pagan foes. Accordingly, as Charlemagne was parti- 
cipating in the solemnities of Christmas Day in the basilica of 
St. Peter at Rome, the Pope approached the kneeling king, and 
placing a crown of gold upon his head proclairhed him Emperor 
and Augustus (a.d. 800). 

The intention of Pope Leo was, by a sort of reversal of the act 
of Constantine the Great, to bring back from the East the seat of 
the imperial court ; but what he really accomplished was a resto- 
ration of the line of emperors in the West, which three hundred 
and twenty-four years before had been ended by Odoacer, when 
he dethroned Romulus Augustulus and sent the royal vestments 



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CHARLES THE GREAT AS A RULER 65 

to Constantinople. We say this was what he actually effected ; 
for the Greeks of the East, disregarding wholly what the Roman 
people and the Pope had done, maintained their line of emperors 
just as though nothing had occurred in Italy. So now from this 
time on for centuries there were, most of the time, two emperors, 
one in the East and another in the West, each claiming to be the 
rightful successor of Caesar Augustus.^ 

This revival of the Empire in the West was one of the most 
important matters in European history. It gave to the following 
centuries "a great poHtical ideal," which was the counterpart of 
the religious ideal of a Universal Church embodied in the Papacy, 
and which was to shape large sections of mediaeval history. 

76. Charles the Great as a Ruler. — Charlemagne must not be 
regarded as a warrior merely. His most noteworthy work was 
that which he effected as a legislator and administrator. In this 
field, too, were exhibited the finer qualities of his masterful per- 
sonality. In building up his great empire Charlemagne practiced 
much cruelty and unrighteousness, but over this empire, once 
established, he ruled with the constant solicitude of a father. 

Among the characteristic institutions of the Empire was the 
Diet, or General Assembly, a survival manifestly of the old 
Teutonic folkmote, an assembly of freemen. This body held a 
meeting every year in the spring.* At these gatherings there 
took place merely an interchange of views between Charlemagne 
and the assembled freemen of the realm ; for the Diet was not 
a legislative body. Its functions were confined to giving the 

8 From this time on it will be proper for us to use the terms Western Empire and 
Eastern Empire, These names should not, however, be employed before this time, 
for the two parts of the old Roman Empire were simply administrative divisions of 
a single empire ; but we may properly enough speak of the Roman Empire in the 
West, and the Roman Empire in tbe East, or of the Western and Eastern emperors. 
What it is very essential to note is, that the restoration of the line of the Western 
emperors actually destroyed the unity of the old Empire, so that from this time on 
until the destruction of the Eastern Empire in 1453, t^^^s viere, as we have said in 
the text, two rival emperors, each in theory having rightful suzerainty of the whole 
world, whereas the two emperors in Roman times were the co-rulers of a single and 
indivisible World Empire. See Bryce's The Holy Roman Empire. 

4 In the autumn there gathered a second smaller assembly, or council, which was 
composed solely of the magnates of the Empire and the chief royal advisers. 



66 CHARLEMAGNE 

Emperor advice and information. Its relation to Charlemagne 
is well shown by the words with which he is represented as having 
once addressed one of its meetings : " Counsel me," he said, 
" that I may know what to do." 

In connection with the General Assembly we should notice 
the celebrated Capitularies of Charlemagne. These were not laws 
proper, but collections of decrees, decisions, and instructions 
covering matters of every kind, civil and religious, public and 
domestic. Some of them were drawn up with the concurrence 
of the Diet; a greater number embodied simply Charlemagne's 
own ideas of what his chiefs or his subjects needed in the way of 
advice, suggestion, or command. 

Another noteworthy feature of the government of Charlemagne 
was the itinerant commissioners (mt'ssz dominici) whose duty it 
was to visit at stated intervals all parts of a given circuit, observe 
how the local magistrates were discharging their several duties, 
correct what was wrong, and report to the Emperor all matters 
of which he should be informed. This was an admirable device 
for putting the head of the vast Empire in close and almost 
personal touch with all its parts near and remote. 

Charlemagne, particularly after his coronation as Emperor, exer- 
cised as careful a superintendence over religious as over civil 
affairs. He called synods or councils of the clergy of his domin- 
ions, presided at these meetings, revised the canons of the Church, 
and addressed to abbots and bishops fatherly words of admoni- 
tion, reproof, and exhortation. 

Education was also a matter to which Charlemagne gave zealous 
attention. He was himself from first to last as diligent a student 
as his busy life permitted. His biographer, Einhard, says that he 
could repeat his prayers as well in Latin as in German, and that 
he understood Greek, although he had difficulty in its pronuncia- 
tion. He never ceased to be a learner. In his old age he tried 
to learn to write, but found that it was too late. 

Distressed by the dense ignorance all about him, Charlemagne 
labored to instruct his subjects, lay and clerical, by the establish- 
ment of schools and the multiplication and dissemination of books 



THE DEATH OF CHARLEMAGNE ^'j 

through the agency of the copyists of the monasteries. He invited 
from England the celebrated Alcuin, one of the finest scholars of 
the age, and with his help organized what became known as the 
Palace School, in which his children and courtiers and he himself 
were pupils. A spirit of rare comradeship seems to have pervaded 
this happy school. The different members of it were in pleasantry 
given Hebrew or classical names. Charlemagne was known as 
King David ; Alcuin, as Flaccus ; while still others bore the names 
of Homer, Pindar, Samuel, Columba, and Jeremiah. 

A great number of other schools were estabhshed by Charle- 
magne in connection with the cathedrals and monasteries through- 
out his dominions. Many of these were organized by Alcuin, 
whose influence was unbounded. In causing the establishment 
of these schools Charlemagne set at work influences that left 
a deep and permanent impression upon European civilization. 
They mark the beginning of a new intellectual life for Western 
Christendom. 

77. The Death of Charlemagne (814) ; his Place in History. — 
Charlemagne enjoyed the imperial dignity only fourteen years, 
dying in 814. Einhard in speaking of the event simply says that 
he was buried on the day of his death within the basilica at 
Aachen, which he himself had built. A later tradition affirms 
that the dead monarch was placed upon a throne, with his royal 
robes about him, his good sword by his side, and a book of the 
Gospels open on his lap.^ It seemed as though men could not 
beHeve that his reign was over. And it was not. 

By the almost universal verdict of students of the mediseval 
period, Charles the Great has been pronounced the most imposing 
personage that appears between the fall of Rome and the fifteenth 
century. " He stands alone," says Hallam, " like a beacon uppn 
a waste, or a rock in the broad ocean." He is the King Arthur 
of the French, — the favorite hero of mediaeval minstrelsy. His 

5 This account differs so widely from that of contemporaries of Charlemagne that 
it cannot be received as historical. Consult Lindner, Die Fabel von der Bestattung 
Karls des Grossen ; Mombert, Charles the Great ^ pp. 484-486; and Hodgkin, 
Charles the Great, p. 250. 



6S CHARLEMAGNE 

greatness has erected an enduring monument for itself in his 
name, the one by which he is best known, — Charlemagne. 

78. The Results of his Reign Among the many results of 

the reign of Charlemagne we should take notice of the three fol- 
lowing. First, he did for Germany what Caesar did for Gaul, — 
brought this barbarian land within the pale of civilization and 
made it a part of the new-forming Romano-German world. 

Second, through the part he played in the revival of the 
Empire, he helped to give to the following generations " a great 
political ideal," and to set up an authority among the European 
princes which was destined to lend character to large sections of 
mediaeval history. 

Third, Charlemagne kneaded into something like a homogene- 
ous mass the various racial elements composing the mixed society 
of the wide regions over which he ruled. Throughout his long 
and vigorous reign that fusion of Roman and Teuton of which we 
spoke in a previous chapter went on apace. He failed indeed to 
unite the various races of his extended dominions in a permanent 
political union, but he did much to create among them those reli- 
gious, intellectual, and social bonds which were never afterwards 
severed. From his time on, as it has been concisely expressed, 
there was a Western Christendom. 

79. Division of the Empire; the Treaty of Verdun (843). 
— Like the kingdom of Alexander and that of many another 
great conqueror, the mighty empire of Charlemagne fell to pieces 
soon after his death. " His scepter was the bow of Ulysses which 
could not be drawn by any weaker hand." 

Charlemagne was followed by his son Lewis, sumamed the 
Pious (814-840). Upon his death fierce contention broke out 
afresh among his surviving sons, Lewis, Charles, and Lothair, 
and myriads of lives were sacrificed in the unnatural strife. 
Finally, by the famous Treaty of Verdun (843), the Empire was 
divided as follows : to Lewis was given the part east of the Rhine, 
the nucleus of the later Germany ; to Charles, the part west of the 
Rhone and the Meuse, one day to become France ; and to 
Lothair, the narrow central strip between these, stretching across 



RENEWAL OF THE EMPIRE BY OTTO I 69 

Europe from the North Sea to the Mediterranean, and including 
the rich lands of the lower Rhine, the valley of the Rhone, and 
Italy. To Ldthair also was given the imperial title. 

This treaty is celebrated, not only because it was the first great 
treaty among the European states, but also on account of its 
marking the divergence from one another, and in some sense the 
origin, of two of the great nations of modern Europe, — Teutonic 
Germany and Romanic France. As shown by the celebrated 
bilingual oath of Strassburg,® there had by this time grown up 
in Gaul, through the mixture of the provincial Latin with Ger- 
man elements, a new speech, which was to grow into the French 
tongue, — the firstborn of the Romance languages.^ 

After this dismemberment of the dominions of Charlemagne 
the annals of the different branches of the Carolingian family 
become intricate, wearisome, and uninstructive. A fate as dark 
and woeful as that which, according to Grecian story, overhung 
the royal house of Thebes seemed to brood over the house of 
Charlemagne. In all its different lines a strange and adverse 
destiny awaited the lineage of the great king. The tenth cen- 
tury witnessed the extinction of the family. 

80. Renewal of the Empire by Otto the Great (962).^ — In the 
division of the dominions of Charlemagne, the imperial title, as 
we have just seen, went to Lothair. The title, however, meant 
scarcely anything, carrying with it litde or no real authority. 
Matters ran on thus for more than a century, the empty honor 
of the title sometimes being enjoyed by the kings of Italy, and 
again by those of the Eastern Franks. 

But with the accession of Otto I to the throne of Germany 
in the year 936, there appeared among the princes of Europe 
a second Charlemagne. Besides being king of Germany, he 
became, through interference on request in the affairs of Italy, 
king of that country also. Furthermore, he wrested large tracts 

6 This was an oath of friendship and mutual fidelity taken by Lewis and Charles 
just before the Treaty of Verdun (in 842). The text of the oath has been preserved 
both in the old German speech and in the new-forming Romance language. It is 
interesting as affording the oldest existing specimens of these languages. 

"^ Compare sees. 44 and 241. 



70 CHARLEMAGNE 

of land from the Slavs, and forced the Danes, Poles, and Hunga- 
rians to acknowledge his suzerainty. Thus favored by fortune, he 
conceived the idea of reviving once more the imperial authority, 
just as it had been revived in the time of the great Charles. 

So in 962, just a little more than a century and a half after 
the coronation at Rome of Charlemagne, Otto, at the same place 
and by the same papal authority, was crowned Emperor of the 
Romans. For a generation no one had borne the title. From 
this time on it was the rule that the prince whom the German 
Electors chose as their king had a right to the crown of Italy and 
also to the imperial crown. 

After this the Empire came to be called the Holy Roman 
Empire, although, as Voltaire very truthfully observed concerning 
It later, it was " neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire." Re- 
specting the great part that the idea of the Empire played in sub- 
sequent history we shall speak in a later chapter (Chapter XI). 

Selections from the Sources. — Eginhard (Einhard), Life of the 
E?nperor Karl the Great. Einhard was Charles' confidential friend and 
secretary. " Almost all our real, vivifying knowledge of Charles the Great," 
says Hodgkin, "is derived from Einhard, and . . . the Vita Caroli is one 
of the most precious bequests of the early Middle Ages." Henderson, 
Select Historical Documents^ pp. 1 89-201, "Capitulary of Charlemagne, 
issued in the year 802." Translations and Reprints^ vol. vi, No. 5, " Selec- 
tions from the Laws of Charles the Great " (ed. by Dana Carleton Munro). 

Secondary Works. — Hodgkin, Charles the Great, and Mombert, A 
JIisto7'y of Charles the Great ; the first is the best short biography in English. 
Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire, chaps, iv, v, and xxi ; gives a clear view 
of the import of the restoration of the Empire. Emerton, Introduction 
to the Middle Ages, chaps, xii-xiv. Sergeant, The Franks, chaps, xvi- 
xxii; an admirable sketch, with a calm and moderate appraisement of 
Charles' work. West, Alcuin and the Rise of the Christian Schools, and 
Mullinger, The Schools of Charles the Great ; for the influence upon the 
intellectual life of the Middle Ages of the schools founded by Charlemagne. 
Freeman, The Chief Periods of European History, Lects. iii and iv. Adams, 
Civilization during the Middle Ages, chap. vii. Davis, Charlemagne. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Charlemagne and the Saxons. 2. Ro- 
mances connected with Charlemagne's expedition against the Moors in 
Spain. 3. Alcuin and the Palace School. 4. Tradition of the burial of 
Charlemagne. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE NORTHMEN: THE COMING OF THE VIKINGS 

8i. The Northern Folk Northmen, Norsemen, Scandina- 
vians, are different names applied in a general way to the early 
inhabitants of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. For the reason 
that those making settlements in England came for the most part 
from Denmark, the term Danes is often used with the same wide 
application by the English writers. These people were very near 
kin to those tribes — Goths, Vandals, Franks, Anglo-Saxons, and 
the rest — that seized upon the western provinces of the Roman 
Empire. They were Teutons in language, religion, habits, and 
spirit. 

82. The Northmen as Pirates and as Colonizers. — For the first 
eight centuries of our era the Norsemen are practically hidden 
from our view in their remote northern home ; but towards the 
end of the eighth century their black piratical crafts are to be 
seen creeping along the coasts of Britain, Ireland, and Gaul, and 
even venturing far up the inlets and creeks. 

Every summer these dreaded sea rovers made swift descents 
upon the exposed shores of these countries, plundered, burned, 
murdered; and then upon the approach of the stormy season 
they returned to winter in the sheltered fiords of the Northern 
peninsulas. After a time the bold corsairs began to winter in the 
lands they had harried during the summer; and soon all the 
shores of the countries visited were dotted with their stations 
and settlements. With a foothold once secured, fresh bands came 
from the crowded lands of the North; the winter stations grew 
into permanent colonies ; the surrounding country was gradually 
wrested from the natives ; and in course of time the settlements 
coalesced into a real kingdom. 

7? 



72 THE NORTHMEN 

Thus Northern Gaul fell at last so completely into the hands 
of the Northmen as to take from them the name of Normandy ; 
while Northeastern England, crowded with settlers from Den- 
mark and surrendered to Danish rule, became known as the 
Danelagh (Dane-law). From Normandy, as a new base of opera- 
tions, fresh colonies went out and made conquests and settle- 
ments in South Italy and Sicily, and in England. While these 
things were going on in Europe, other bands of Northmen were 
pushing out into the western seas and colonizing Iceland .and 
Greenland, and visiting the shores of the American continent. 

Commencing in the latter part of the eighth century, 
these marauding expeditions and colonizing enterprises 




Fig. 12. — A Viking Ship 

It was the custom of the Northmen to bury their dead sea king near the sea in 
his ship and over the spot to raise a great mound of earth. The boat shown 
in the cut was found in 1880 in a burial mound at Gokstadt, South Norway. 
Its length is 78 feet. From the mode of sepulture it is inferred that the 
mound was raised between a.d. 700 and 1000 

did not cease until the eleventh century was far advanced. The 
consequences of this wonderful outpouring of the Scandinavian 
peoples were so important and lasting that the movement may 
well be compared, as it has been, to the great migration of their 
German kinsmen in the fifth and sixth centuries. Europe is a 
second time inundated by the Teutonic barbarians. 

The most noteworthy characteristic of these Northmen is the 
readiness with which they laid aside their own manners, habits,, 
ideas, and institutions, and adopted those of the country in which 
they established themselves. " In Russia they became Russians ; in. 
France, Frenchmen ; in Italy, Italians ; in England, Englishmen." 



DISCOVERIES OF THE NORTHMEN 



73 



83. Colonization of Iceland and Greenland ; the Discovery of 
America. — Iceland was settled by the Northmen in the ninth 
century,^ and about a century later ^Greenland was discovered 
and colonized. In 1874 the Icelanders celebrated the thou- 
sandth anniversary of the settlement of their island, an event 
very like our Centennial of 1876. 

America was reached by the Northmen as early as the open- 
ing of the eleventh century ; the " Vinland " of their traditions 
was probably some part of the New England coast. Whether 
these first 
visitors to the 
continent ever 
made any set- 
tlements in the 
new land is a 
disputed ques- 
tion. 

84. The 
Norsemen in 
Russia. — 
While the Nor- 
wegians were 
sailing boldly 
out into the 

Atlantic and taking possession of the isles and coasts of the west- 
ern seas, the Swedes were pushing their crafts across the Baltic 
and troubling the Finns and Slavs on the eastern shore of that 
sea. Either by right of conquest or through the invitation of the 
contentious Slavonic clans, the renowned Scandinavian chieftain 

1 Iceland became the literary center of the Scandinavian world. There grew up 
here a class of scalds, or bards, who, before the introduction of writing, preserved 
and transmitted orally the sagas, or legends, of the Northern races. About the 
middle of the thirteenth century these poems and legends were gathered into col- 
lections known as the Elder or Poetic Edda and the Younger or Prose Edda. 
These are among the most interesting and important of the literary memorials that 
we possess of the early Teutonic peoples. They reflect faithfully the beliefs, man- 
ners, and customs of the Norsemen, and the wild, adventurous spirit of their 
sea kings. 




Discoveries of the Northmen 



74 THE NORTHMEN 

Ruric acquired, about the middle of the ninth century, kingly 
dignity, and became the founder of the first royal line of Russia. 
The state established by him and his descendants was the beginning, 
or rather the prototype, of the great empire of the modern Tsars. 

85. The Danish Conquest of England. — The Northmen — 
Danes, as called by the English writers — began to make descents 
upon the English coast toward the close of the eighth century. 
These sea rovers spread the greatest terror throughout the island; 
for they were not content with plunder, but, being pagans, took 
special delight in burning the churches and monasteries of the 
now Christian Anglo-Saxons, or English, as we shall hereafter call 
them. In a short time fully one half of England was in their 
hands. The wretched English were subjected to exactly the same 
treatment that they had inflicted upon the Celts. Just when it 
began to look as though they would be wholly enslaved or driven 
from the island by the heathen intruders, Alfred (871-901), later 
to be known as Alfred the Great,^ came to the throne of Wessex. 

For six years the youthful king fought heroically at the head 
of his brave thanes ; but each year the possessions of the English 
grew smaller, and finally Alfred and his few remaining followers 
were forced to take refuge in the woods and morasses. After a 
time, however, the affairs of .Alfred began to mend. He gained 
some advantage over the Danes, but he could not expel them 
from the island, and by the celebrated Treaty of Wedmore (878) 
gave up to them all the northeastern part of England. 

2 Alfred is the only sovereign of England on whom the title of Great has been con- 
ferred. Perhaps his best claims to this distinction spring from his work as a lawgiver 
and a patron of learning. He collected and revised the ancient laws of the Anglo- 
Saxons, tempering and altering them in accordance with Christian morals and prin- 
ciples. The code that he thus made formed the basis of early English jurisprudence. 
Alfred also fostered learning by himself becoming a translator. With the exception 
of the Bible, some short poems, and the well-known Paraphrase of the Scriptures 
(see sec. 22), the translations by Alfred were the first books written in their own 
tongue that the English had placed in their hands. Here we have the beginnings of 
the prose literature of England. " The mighty roll of the prose books that fill her 
libraries," writes Green, " begins with the translations of Alfred, and above all with 
the Chronicle of his reign," The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle here alluded to was a minute 
and chronological record of events, probably begun in systematic form in Alfred's 
reign and continued down to the year 1154. It was kept by the monks of different 
monasteries, and forms one of our most valuable soixrces for early English history. 



II 






SETTLEMENT OF THE NORTHMEN IN GAUL 75 

For a full century following the death of Alfred his successors 
were engaged in a constant struggle to hold in restraint the Danes 
already settled in the land, or to protect their domains from the 
plundering inroads of fresh bands of pirates from the Northern 
peninsulas. In the end the Danes got the victory, and Canute, 
king of Denmark, became king of England (10 16). For eighteen 
years he reigned in a wise and parental way. 

Altogether the Danes ruled in England about a quarter of a 
century, and then the old English line was restored in the person 
of Edward the Confessor (1042). 

86. Settlement of the Northmen in Gaul. — The Northmen 
began to make piratical descents upon the coasts of Gaul before 
the end of the reign of Charlemagne. The great king had been 
dead only thirty years when these sea rovers ascended the Seine 
and sacked Paris (845). 

We need not stop to give in detail the story of their subsequent 
plundering expeditions in Gaul and of their final settlement in 
the northwest of the country, for this is simply a repetition of the 
tale of the Danish forays and settlement in England. At last, the 
Carolingian king, Charles the Simple, did something very like 
what Alfred the Great had done across the Channel only a short 
time before. He granted to Rollo, the leader of the Northmen 
who had settled at Rouen, a considerable section of country in the 
north of Gaul, upon condition of homage and conversion (912). 
In a short time the newcomers had adopted the language, the 
manners, and the religion of the Trench, and had caught much 
of their vivacity and impulsiveness of spirit, without, however, 
any loss of their own native virtues. This transformation in their 
manners and life we may conceive as being recorded in their trans- 
formed name, — Northmen becoming softened into Norman. 

87. Normandy in French History. — The establishment of a 
Scandinavian settlement in Gaul proved a most momentous 
matter, not only for the history of the French people, but for 
the history of European civilization as well. This Norse factor 
was destined to be one of the most important of all those various 
racial elements which on the soil of the old Gaul blended to 



76 THE NORTHMEN 

create the richly dowered French nation. For many of the most 
romantic passages of her history France is indebted to the adven- 
turous spirit of the descendants of these wild rovers of the sea. 
The knights of Normandy lent an added splendor to French 
knighthood, and helped greatly to make France the hearth of chiv- 
alry and the center of the crusading movement of the eleventh 
and twelfth centuries. 

Nor was the influence of the incoming of this Scandinavian 
race felt upon French history alone. Normandy became the 
point of departure of enterprises that had deep and lasting con- 
sequences for Europe at large. These undertakings had for their 
arena England and the Mediterranean lands. Their results were 
so important and far-reaching that we shall devote to the nar- 
ration of them a subsequent chapter (Chapter X). 

Selections from the Sources. — The Heimskringla, or Chronicle of the 
Ki7tgs of Norway (trans, by Samuel Laing). These sagas are of surpassing 
value to us for the reason that, in the words of Keary, they are " the last 
articulate voice of Teutonic heathenism." The Story of Burjit Njal 
(trans, by George W. Dasent). An Icelandic saga ; a picture of times and 
manners. Mabie, Norse Stories, retold from the Eddas. Colby, Selec- 
tions, Nos. 8, 9, and jo. Kendall, Source-Book, chap, ii, " England and 
the Danes." 

Secondary Works. — Keary, The Vikings in Western Christendom. 
The author depicts the various Viking undertakings as " one phase ... of 
the long struggle between Christianity and the heathenism of the North." 
Pauli, The Life of Alfred the Great ; the best life of the great king. 
Green, The Conquest of England ; all excepting chaps, x and xi. Du 
Chaillu, The Viking Age ; reflects the life and ideals, customs and 
manners of the Norsemen, chiefly as depicted in the sagas. Hughes, 
Alfred the Great. The millenary celebration of Alfred's death has called 
into existence an " Alfred Library." Among these recent books the fol- 
lowing should be noticed: Macfadyen, Alfred, the West Saxon, and 
BowKER, Alfred the Great. Boyesen, The Story of Norway ; the open- 
ing chapters. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The physical characteristics of Scandi- 
navia. 2. Manners and customs of the Northmen. 3. The Eddas. 4. The 
Icelanders' millennial anniversary, 1874. 5. Discovery of America by the 
Northmen. 6. Tales and legends of Alfred the Great. 



SECOND PERIOD — THE AGE OF REVIVAL 

(From the Opening of the Eleventh Century to the Discovery of 
America by Columbus in 1492) 



CHAPTER IX 
FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

I. Feudalism 

88. Feudalism defined. — Feudalism is the name given to a 
special form of society and government, based upon a peculiar 
tenure of land, which prevailed in Europe during the latter part 
of the Middle Ages, attaining, however, its most perfect develop- 
ment in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries. 

The three most essential features of the system were : (i) the 
holding of land from a lord or superior; (2) the existence of a 
close personal bond between the grantor of an estate and the 
receiver of it ; (3) the full or partial rights of sovereignty which 
the holder of an estate had over those living upon it. 

An estate of this. nature — it might embrace a few acres or 
an entire kingdom — was called a fief or feud, whence the term 
Feudalism. The person granting a fief was called the suzerain^ liege,. 
or lord ; the one receiving it, his vassal, liegeman, or retainer. 

A person receiving a large fief might parcel it out in tracts 
to others on terms similar to those on which he himself had 
received it. This regranting of feudal lands was known as subin- 
feudation; in principle it was not unlike what we know as the 
subletting of lands. The process of subinfeudation might be 
carried to almost any degree. Practically it was seldom carried 
beyond the fourth stage. 

77 



yS FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

89. The Ideal System. — The few definitions given above will 
render intelligible the following explanation of the theory of the 
feudal system. We take the theory of the system first for the 
reason that it is infinitely simpler than the thing itself. In fact, 
feudalism, as we find it in actual practice, was one of the most 
complex institutions that the mediaeval ages produced. 

In theory all the kings of the earth were vassals of the Emperor, 
who according to good imperialists was God's vassal, and according 
to good churchmen, the Pope's. The kings received their domin- 
ions as fiefs to be held on conditions of loyalty to their suzerain 
and of fealty to right and justice. Should a king become disloyal 
or rule unjustly and wickedly, through such misconduct he for- 
feited his fief, and it might be taken from him by his suzerain 
and given to another worthier liegeman. 

In the same way as the king received his fief from the Emperor, 
so might he grant it out in parcels to his chief men, they, in return 
for it, promising, in general, to be faithful to him as their lord, 
and to serve and aid him. Should these men, now vassals, be in 
any way untrue to their engagement, they forfeited their fiefs, 
and these might be resumed by their suzerain and bestowed upon 
others. 

In like manner these immediate vassals of the king, or suzerain, 
might parcel out their domains in smaller tracts to others, on con- 
ditions similar to those upon which they had themselves received 
theirs ; and so on down through any number of stages. 

We have thus far dealt only with the soil of a country. We 
must next notice what disposition was made of the people under 
this system. 

The king in receiving his fief was intrusted with sovereignty 
over all persons living upon it; he became their commander, 
their lawmaker, and their judge, — practically, their absolute and 
irresponsible ruler. Then, when he parceled out his fief among 
his great men, he invested them, within the limits of the fiefs 
granted, with all his own sovereign rights. Each vassal became 
a virtual sovereign in his own domain. And when these great 
vassals subdivided their fiefs and granted portions of them to 



THE ORIGIN OF FIEFS 79 

others, they in turn invested their vassals with more or less of 
those powers of sovereignty with which they themselves had 
been clothed.^ 

To illustrate the workings of the system, we will suppose the 
king, or suzerain, to be in, need of an army. He calls upon his 
own immediate vassals for aid ; these in turn call upon their 
vassals ; and so the order runs down through the various stages 
of the hierarchy. Each lord commands only his own vassals. 
The retainers in the lowest rank rally around their respective 
lords, who, with their bands, gather about their lords, and so on 
up through the rising tiers of the hierarchy, until the immediate 
vassals of the suzerain, or lord paramount, present themselves 
before him with their graduated trains of followers. The array 
constitutes a feudal army, — a splendidly organized body in 
theory, but in fact an extremely poor instrument for warfare. 

Such was the ideal feudal state. It is needless to say that the 
ideal was never perfectly realized. The system simply made more 
or less distant approaches to it in the several European countries. 
But this general idea which we have tried to give of the theory 
of the system will help to an understanding of it as we find it in 
actual existence. 

We will now in three distinct paragraphs say a word about the 
probable origin -of the three prominent elements of the system, — 
namely, the fief, the patronage, and the sovereignty. 

90. The Originr of Fiefs. — In the sixth century probably the 
greater portion of the soil of the countries which had once formed 
a part of the Roman Empire in the West was held by what was 
called an allodial or freehold tenure. The landed, proprietor 
owned his domain absolutely, held it just as a man among us 
holds his estate. He enjoyed it free from any rent or service due 
to a superior, save of course public taxes and duties. But by the 
end of the eleventh century probably the larger part of the land 

1 The holders of small fiefs were not allowed to exercise the more important 
functions of sovereignty. Thus, of the estimated number of 70,000 fief holders in 
France in the tenth ceatury, only between 100 and 200 possessed the right "to coio 
-money, levy taxes, maice laws, and administer their own justice." 



8o FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

in these same countries, as well as in other regions into which the 
feudal system had been carried, was held by a beneficiary or feudal 
tenure. We must now see how this great change came about. 

The fief grew out of the beneficimn, a form of estate well known 
among the Romans. When the barbarians overran the soil of the 
Empire, they appropriated, as we have seen, a good part of it to 
their own use. The king or leader of the invading tribe naturally 
had allotted to him a large share. Following his custom of bestow- 
ing gifts of arms and other articles upon his companions, he 
granted to his followers and friends parcels of his domains, upon 
the simple condition of faithfulness. At first these estates were 
bestowed only for life, and were called by the Latin name of bene- 
fices; but in the course of time they became hereditary, and then 
they began to be called fiefs or feuds. They took this latter name 
about the ninth century. As the royal lands were very extensive 
and were being constantly added to by inheritance and successful 
wars, these were a very important source of feudal estates. 

Another and still more important source of fiefs was usurpation. 
Under the later Carolingians the counts, dukes, marquises, and 
other royal officers, who were at first simply appointed magistrates, 
succeeded, by taking advantage of the weakness of their sovereigns, 
in making their offices hereditary, and then in having their duchies, 
counties, and provinces regarded as fiefs granted .to them by the 
king. By the year 877 this process had proceeded so far that in 
that year Charles the Bald of France recognized the hereditary 
character of the offices of his counts. In this way the countries 
originally embraced within the limits of the empire of Charlemagne 
became broken up into a considerable number of enormous fiefs, 
the heads of which, bearing the names of count, duke, marquis, 
and so on, became the great vassals of the crown. 

Another way in which fiefs arose was through the owners of 
allodial estates voluntarily surrendering them into the hands of 
some powerful lord, and then receiving them back as benefices 
or fiefs. We shall see, a little further on, how the confusion and 
anarchy of the ninth and tenth centuries caused multitudes of 
allodial proprietors thus to turn their freeholds into fiefs, that 



ORIGIN OF THE FEUDAL PATRONAGE 8 1 

they might thereby come within the feudal system and enjoy its 
advantages and protection. 

91. Origin of the Feudal Patronage. — We named the close 
personal tie uniting the lord and his vassal as the second of the 
essential features of the feudal system. Some have traced this to 
the Teutons, and think it the same tie as that which bound the 
companion to his chief and created the ancient German institu- 
tion known as the comitatus. Others have pronounced it iden- 
tical with the tie that at Rome bound the client to his patron. 
Still others have traced it to the Celtic or Gallic custom of com- 
mendation, whereby a person subjected himself to a more power- 
ful lord for the sake of his patronage and protection. All these 
things indeed are very much alike, and any one might have served 
as the germ out of which feudal patronage, the special relation of 
lord and vassal, was developed. 

The important thing to bear in mind, however, is that in the 
Frankish kingdom, which was the cradle of feudalism, we find all 
the officers of the court and the great men of the nation holding 
to the king relations of sworn fidelity and trust which were in 
various respects analogous to the relations that subsisted in earlier 
times between the German war leader and his companions. 

Now, in time this peculiar personal relation, characterized on the 
part of the vassal by pledges of fealty, service, and aid, and on 
the part of the lord by promise of counsel and protection, came 
to be united with the benefice, with which at first it had nothing to 
do. The union of these two ties completed the feudal tenure. 

92. Origin of the Feudal Sovereignty. — It still remains to speak 
of the feudal sovereignty. How did the possessor of a fief acquire 
the rights of a sovereign over the persons living upon it, — the 
right to administer justice, to coin money, and to wage war ? 
How did these privileges and authorities which at first resided in 
the king come to be distributed among the fief holders ? In two 
ways largely, — by the king's voluntary surrender of his rights and 
powers, and by usurpation. 

Thus the Merovingian and Carolingian rulers very frequently 
conferred upon churches, monasteries, and important personages a 



82 



FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 



portion of the royal power. This was done by what were known as 
grants of immunity? Thus a monastery, for instance, would, by 
such a grant, be freed from certain public charges and duties, and 
be given administrative and judicial authority over all classes of 
persons living upon its lands. In this way the royal authority 
was much scattered and weakened. 

A still more important source of feudal sovereignty was the 
usurpation of the kingly power by the royal officers. Under the 
later Carolingians these magistrates, as we have already seen, suc- 
ceeded in making their offices hereditary, and thus transformed 
themselves into petty sovereigns, only nominally dependent upon 
their king. They became powerful vassals, while their sovereign 
became a suzerain, a shadow king. By such usurpations the king- 
doms into which the empire of Charlemagne was at first broken 

became still further subdivided into 
numerous petty feudal principalities, 
and the royal power was distributed 
down through the ranks of a more or 
less perfectly graded civil hierarchy. 
93. The Ceremony of Homage. — 
A fief was conferred by a very solemn 
and peculiar ceremony called hom- 
age. The person about to become 
a vassal, kneeling with uncovered 
head, placed his hands in those of 
his future lord and solemnly vowed 
to be henceforth his man^ and to 
serve him faithfully even with his 
life. This part of the ceremony, sealed with a kiss, was what 
properly constituted the ceremony of homage. It was accom- 
panied by an oath of fealty, and the whole was concluded by the 

2 A grant of immunity may for purposes of illustration be compared to the 
charter granted by the modern state to the board of directors of a college or other 
corporation, whereby are conferred upon this body limited rights of legislation and 
jurisdiction ; or a better illustration perhaps would be the Constitution that the United 
States Government by its ratification gives to a territory and thereby makes it a 
State with many sovereign powers. Federalism indeed presents various instructive 
analogies to feudalism. 8 Latin homo^ whence " homage." 




Fig. 13. — The Ceremony of 
Homage. (From a seal of 
the twelfth century) 



THE RELATIONS OF LORD AND VASSAL 83 

act of investiture, whereby the lord put his vassal in actual pos- 
session of the land or, by placing in his hand a clod of earth or 
a twig, symbolized the delivery to him of the estate for which he 
had just now done homage and sworn fealty. 

94. The Relations of Lord and VassaL — In general terms the 
duty of the vassal was service ; that of the lord, protection. The 
most honorable service required of the vassal, and the one most 
willingly rendered in a martial age, was military aid. The liegeman 
must always be ready to follow his lord upon his military expedi- 
tions ; but the time of service for one year was usually not more 
than forty days. He must defend his lord in battle ; if he should 
be unhorsed, must give him his own animal ; and, if he should be 
made a prisoner, must offer himself as a hostage for his release. 
He must also give entertainment to his lord and his retinue on 
their journeys. He was, moreover, under obligation, upon sum- 
mons, to serve as juror or judge in the lord's court, and thus aid 
him in the settlement of disputes between his vassals. 

There were other incidents mainly of a financial nature attach- 
ing to a fief, which grew up gradually and did not become a part 
of the system much before the eleventh century. These were 
known as Reliefs, Fines upon Alienation, Escheats, and Aids. 

A Relief was the name given to the sum of money which an 
heir upon coming into possession of a fief must pay to the lord 
of the domain. This was often a large amount, being usually the 
entire revenue of the estate for one year. 

A Fine upon AHenation was a sum of money paid to the lord 
by a vassal for permission to ahenate his fief, that is, to substitute 
another vassal in his place. 

By Escheat was meant the falling back of the fief into the hands 
of the lord through failure of heirs. If the fief lapsed through dis- 
loyalty or other misdemeanor on the part of the vassal, this was 
known as Forfeiture. 

Aids were sums of money which the lord had a right to demand 
to enable him to meet unusual expenditures, especially for defray- 
ing the expense of knighting his eldest son, for providing a mar- 
riage dower for his eldest daughter, and for ransoming his own 



S4 FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

person from captivity in case he were made a prisoner of war.* 
The chief return that the lord was bound to make to the vassal 
as a compensation for these various services and rights was justice 
and protection, — by no means a small return in an age of turmoil 
and insecurity. 

95. Serfs ^ and Serfdom. — The vassals, or fief holders of vari- 
ous grades, constituted only a very small portion, perhaps five per 
cent or less, of the population of the countries where feudaHsm 
came to prevail. The great bulk of the folk were agricultural 
serfs.® These were the men who actually tilled the soil. Just 
how this servile class arose is not positively known. Some think 
that the ancestors of the mediaeval serfs were bondsmen, others 
that they were, speaking generally, freemen. In some countries 
at least they seem to have been the lineal descendants of the 
slaves of Roman times, whose condition had been gradually 
ameliorated. Their status varied greatly from country to country 
and- from period to period ; that is to say, there came to be many 
grades of serfs filling the space between the actual slave and the 
full freeman. Consequently it is impossible to give any general 
account of the class which can be regarded as a true picture of 
their actual condition as a body at any given time. The following 
description must therefore be taken as reflecting their duties and 
disabilities only in the most general way. 

The first and most characteristic feature of the condition of 
the serfs was that they were affixed to the soil. They could not 

4 The right of wardship was the right of the lord, when a successor to a fief was a 
minor, to assume the guardianship of the heir and to enjoy the revenues of the fief 
until his ward became of age. The right of marriage was the right of the lord to 
select a husband for his female ward, " lest he should get an enemy for a vassal." 

5 The terms serf and villain, although in some countries they denoted different 
classes, are used interchangeably by many writers. Thus English writers usually 
employ the terms villains and villanage in speaking of the servile English peasantry 
after the Norman Conquest. We shall, however, throughout our work use the words 
serf and serfdom only in the sense defined in the present paragraph. 

6 There were some free peasants and a larger number of free artisans and traders, 
inhabitants of the towns. The number of actual slaves was small. They had almost 
all disappeared before the end of the tenth century, either having been emancipated 
or been lifted into the lowest order of serfs, which was an advance toward freedom. 
At the time of the great Domesday survey (sec. 117) there were, according to this 
record, only about 25,000 slaves in Englani 



^ 



MAP OF 

HITCHIN MANOR,! 

ENGI.AND 

(About 1816) 



mi 



''/r^ij 




^^^lU 



M 




Scale of a Mile 
( each division being an Acre ) 




Photograph of an Open Field in Hitchin Manor 

Showing the grassy balks, or unplowed furrows, which take the place of hedges 
and divide the acre and half-acre strips of the great open field 

! This map is based on charts in Seebohm's T/te English J 'illage Coinmunity, and 
illustrates the open-field system of cultivation of the mediseval manor. The thirty scattered 
strips colored red represent tlie normal holding of a villain {villninti) ; the strips colored 
blue, comprising about one third of the land of the manor, show the way in which the 
demesne of the lord was often made up of numerous tracts scattered about the open fields 
instead of forming a continuous tract around the manor house ; the areas colored green 
represent the meadows and common pasture lands. 



SERFS AND SERFDOM 8$ 

of their own will leave the estate or manor to which they belonged ; 
nor, on the other hand, could their lord deprive them of their 
holdings and set them adrift. When the land changed masters 
they passed with it, just like a " rooted tree or stone earth-bound." 
It was this that constituted the peasants serfs in the sense in which 
we shall use the term. 

Each serf had allotted him by his lord a cottage and a number 
of acres of land, — thirty acres formed a normal holding, — con- 
sisting of numerous narrow strips scattered about the great open 
fields of the manor. For these he paid a rent, usually during the 
earlier feudal times in kind and in personal services. The personal 
services included a certain number of days' work, usually two or 
three days each week, on the demesne, that is, the land which 
the lord had kept in his own hands as a sort of home farm. The 
nature of the work consisted in plowing the lord's land, tilling 
and weeding his crops, ditching, building walls, repairing roads 
and bridges, cutting and hauling wood to the manor house, wash- 
ing and shearing sheep, feeding the hounds, and picking nuts and 
wild berries for the folk in the castle. Often the poor serf could 
find time to till his own little plot only on moonlit nights or on 
rainy days. He 'must furthermore grind his grain at his lord's 
mill, press his grapes at his wine press, bake his bread at his 
oven, often paying for these services an unreasonable toll. 

After the serf had rendered to the lord all the rent in kind he 
owed for his cottage and bit of ground, the remainder of the 
produce from his fields was, in accordance with custom if not 
always with law, his own. Generally the share was only just 
sufficient to keep the wolf of hunger from his door. Some serfs, 
however, were able to accumulate considerable personal property, 
enough w^herewith to purchase their freedom. 

In some countries upon the death of the serf all that he had 
became in the eye of the law the property of his lord ; in other 
lands, again, the lord could take only the best animal or the best 
implement of the deceased serf. This was called the heriot. 

Besides all these payments, services, gifts, and dues, there were 
often others of a whimsical and teasing rather than an oppressive 



86 FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

nature. But of these we need not now speak. What we have 
already said will convey some idea of the nature of the relations 
that existed between the lord and his serf, and will indicate how 
servile and burdensome were the incidents of the tenure by which 
the serf held his cottage and bit of ground. How the serf gradu- 
ally freed himself from the heavy yoke of his servitude and became 
a freeman will appear as we advance in our narrative. 

96. Development of the Feudal System. — Although the germs 
of feudalism may be found in the society of the fifth or sixth cen- 
tury, still the system did not develop so as to exhibit its charac- 
teristic features before the eighth or ninth. 

What greatly contributed to the development of feudalism, par- 
ticularly on its military side, was the means adopted by Charles 
Martel, after the battle of Tours, to repel the continued raids of 
the Arab horsemen into Southern Gaul. Foot soldiers being useless 
in the pursuit of the mounted marauders, Charles created a cav- 
alry force, appropriating for this purpose Church lands which he 
granted in fief to meet the cost of service on horseback. This 
was the opening of the day of feudal chivalry (sec. 102). Grad- 
ually the old general levies of foot soldiers were almost wholly 
superseded by arrays of feudal knights. 

This development of feudalism as a defensive military system 
and in the typical form which it had now assumed in the Gallic 
border land between Saracen and Christian was hastened by the 
disturbed state of society everywhere during the greater part of 
the ninth and the tenth century; for after the death of Charle- 
magne and the partition of his empire among his feeble successors, 
it appeared as though the world were again falling back into 
chaos. The bonds of society seemed entirely broken. Every man 
did that which was right in his own eyes. 

To internal disorders were added the invasions of the outside 
barbarians ; for, no longer held in restraint by the strong arm of 
the great Charles, they had now begun their raids anew. From 
the north came the Scandinavian pirates to harry the shores of 
Germany, Gaul, and Britain. The terror which these pagan sea 
rovers inspired is commemorated by the supplication of the litany 



DEVELOPMENT OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM 8/ 

of those days : " From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord, dehver 
us." From the east came the terrible Hungarians. These pagan 
marauders not only devastated Germany but troubled Southern 
France and, passing the Alps, spread before them a terror like that 
which had run before the Huns nearly five hundred years earlier. 

By the way of the sea on the south came an equally dreaded 
foe. The Saracens, now intrenched in Spain and Sicily, made 
piratical descents upon all the Christian shores of the Western 
and Middle Mediterranean, sacking and burning, and creating 
here such panic and dismay as the Northmen and Hungarians 
were creating by their irruptions in the north and east. 

It was this anarchical state of things that, as we have said, 
caused the rapid development of feudalism. All classes hastened 
to enter the system in order to secure the protection which it 
alone could afford. Kings, princes, and wealthy persons who had 
large landed possessions which they had never parceled out as 
fiefs, were now led to do so, that their estates might be held by 
tenants bound to protect them by all the sacred obligations of 
homage and fealty. Thus sovereigns and princes became suze- 
rains and feudal lords. Again, the smaller proprietors who held 
their estates by allodial tenure voluntarily surrendered them into 
the hands of some neighboring lord, and then received them back 
again from him as fiefs, that they might claim protection as 
vassals. They deemed this better than being robbed of their 
property altogether. 

Moreover, for like reasons and in hke manner, churches, 
monasteries, and cities became members of the feudal system. 
They granted out their vast possessions as fiefs, and thus became 
suzerains and lords. Bishops and abbots became the heads of 
great bands of retainers, and often themselves led military expe- 
ditions like temporal chiefs. On the other hand, these same 
monasteries and towns frequently placed themselves under the 
protection of some powerful lord, and thus came in vassalage to 
him. Sometimes the bishops and the heads of religious houses, 
instead of paying military service, bound themselves to say a 
certain number of Masses for the lord or his family. Lewis the 



88 



FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 



Pious, son and successor of Charles the Great, decreed that with 
some exceptions all the monasteries of his domains should hold 
their estates on the sole condition " that they should pray for the 
welfare of the Emperor and his children and the Empire." 

In this way were Church and State, all classes of society from the 
wealthiest suzerain to the humblest vassal, bound together by feudal 
ties. Everything was impressed with the stamp of feudalism. 

97. Castles of the Nobles. — The lawless and violent character 
of the times during which feudalism prevailed is well shown by 
the nature of the residences which the great nobles built for 




Fig. 14. — Typical Medieval Castle. (From an engraving) 

themselves. These were strong stone fortresses, often perched 
upon some rocky eminence, and defended by moats and towers. 
France, Germany, Italy, Northern Spain, England, and Scot- 
land, in which countries the feudal system became most thoroughly 
developed, fairly bristled with these fortified residences of the 
nobility. Strong walls were the only protection against the univer- 
sal violence of the age. Not only had each lord to protect himself 
against the attacks of neighboring chiefs, but also against those of 
foreign foes, such as the Hungarians and the Northmen ; for there 
was no strong central authority to make law respected and to give 
protection to all. 



CAUSES OF THE DECAY OF FEUDALISM 89 

One of the most striking and picturesque features of the land- 
scape of many regions in Europe to-day is the ivy-mantled towers 
and walls of these feudal castles, now falling into ruins. They 
are impressive memorials of an age that has passed away. 

98. Sports of the Nobles ; Hunting and Hawking. — When not 
engaged in mihtary enterprises, the nobles occupied much of 
their time in hunting and hawking. " With the northern barba- 
rians," writes Hallam, " it [hunting] was rather a predominant 
appetite than an amusement; it was their pride and their orna- 
ment, the theme of their songs, the object of their laws, and the 
business of their lives." It was the forest laws of the Norman 
conquerors of England, designed for the protection of the game in 
the royal preserves, which, perhaps more than anything else, caused 
these foreign rulers to be so hated by the English (sec. 118). 

Abbots and bishops entered upon the chase with as great zest 
as the lay nobles. Even the prohibitions of Church councils 
against the clergy's indulging in such worldly amusements were 
wholly ineffectual. 

Hawking grew into a very passion among all classes, even 
ladies participating in the sport. In the celebrated tapestries 
and upon all the monuments of the feudal age, the greyhound 
and the falcon, the dog lying at the feet of his master and the 
bird perched upon his wrist, are, after the knightly sword and 
armor, the most common emblems of nobility. 

99. Causes of the Decay of Feudalism. — Chief among the 
various causes which undermined and at length overthrew feudal- 
ism were the hostility of the kings and the common people to the 
system, the Crusades, the growth of the cities, and the introduc- 
tion of firearms in the art of war. 

The feudal system was hated and opposed by both the royal 
power and the people. In fact it was never regarded with much 
favor by any class save the nobles, who enjoyed its advantages 
at the expense of all the other orders of society. Kings opposed 
it and sought to break it down, because it left them only the 
semblance of power. We shall see later how the kings came 
again to their own (Chapter XVII). 



90 FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

The common people always hated it for the reason that under 
it they were regarded as of less value than the game in the lord's 
hunting park. The record of their struggles for recognition in 
society and a participation in the privileges of the haughty feudal 
aristocracy forms the most interesting and instructive portions of 
mediaeval and even of later history. 

The Crusades, or Holy Wars, that agitated all Europe during 
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries did much to weaken the 
power of the nobles ; for in order to raise money for their expe- 
ditions they frequently sold or mortgaged their estates, and in 
this way power and influence passed into the hands of the kings 
or the wealthy merchants of the cities. Many of the great nobles 
also perished in battle with the infidels, and their lands escheated 
to their suzerain, whose domains were thus augmented. 

The growth of the towns also tended to the same end. As 
they increased in wealth and influence, they became able to resist 
the exactions and tyranny of the lord in whose fief they happened 
to be, and eventually were able to secede, as it were, from his 
authority, and to make of themselves little republics. 

Again, improvements and changes in the mode of warfare, 
especially those resulting from the use of gunpowder, hastened 
the downfall of feudalism by rendering the yeoman foot soldier 
equal to the armor-clad knight. " It made all men of the same 
height," as Carlyle puts it. The people with muskets in their 
hands could assert and make good their rights. And the castle, 
the body of feudalism, that in which it lived and moved and 
had its being, now became a useless thing. Its walls might bid 
defiance to the mounted, steel-clad baron and his retainers, but 
they could offer little protection against well-trained artillery. 

But it is to be carefully noted that, though feudalism as a 
system of government disappeared, speaking broadly, with the 
Middle Ages,"^ it still continued to exist as a social organization. 

?■ Different events and circumstances marked the decline and extinction of feu- 
dalism in the various countries of Europe (Chapter XVII). In England it was the 
contention for the crown, known as the Wars of the Roses (1455-1485), in which 
many of the nobility were killed or ruined in estate, that gave the deathblow to 
the institution there. The ruin of the system in France may be dated from the 



DEFECTS OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM 91 

The nobles lost their power and authority as petty sovereigns, 
but retained their titles, their privileges, their social distinction, 
and, in many cases, their vast landed estates. 

100. Defects of the Feudal System. — Feudalism was perhaps 
the best form of social organization that it was possible to main- 
tain in Europe during the mediaeval period; yet it had many 
and serious defects. Among its chief faults may be pointed out 
the two following. 

First, it rendered impossible the formation of strong national 
governments. Every country was divided and subdivided into a 
vast number of practically independent principalities. Thus in 
the tenth century France was partitioned among about a hundred 
and fifty overlords, all exercising equal and coordinate powers of 
sovereignty. The enormous estates of these great lords were again 
subdivided into about seventy thousand smaller fiefs. 

In theory, as we have seen, the holders of these petty estates 
were bound to serve and obey their overlords, and these great 
nobles were in turn the sworn vassals of the French king. But many 
of these lords were richer and stronger than the king himseK, and 
if they chose to cast off their allegiance to him, he found it impos- 
sible to reduce them to obedience. The king's time was chiefly 
occupied in ineffectual efforts to reduce his haughty and refractory 
nobles to proper submission, and in intervening feebly to compose 
their endless quarrels with one another. It is easy to conceive the 
disorder and wretchedness produced by this state of things. 

A second evil of the institution was its exclusiveness. Under 
the workings of the system society became divided into classes 
separated by lines which, though not impassable, were yet very 
rigid, with a proud hereditary aristocracy at its head. It was only 
as the lower classes in the different countries gradually wrested 
from the feudal nobility their special and unfair privileges that a 
better, because more democratic, form of society arose, and civili- 
zation began to make more rapid progress. 

establishment of a regular standing army by Charles VII (in 1448), The rubbish 
of the institution, however, was not cleared away in that country until the great 
Revolution of 1789. In Spain the feudal aristocracy received its deathblow at the 
hands of Ferdinand and Isabella, in the latter part of the fifteenth century. 



92 



FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 



1 01. The Good Results of Feudalism. — The most conspicuous 
service that feudalism rendered European civilization was the 
protection which it gave to society after the break-up of the 
empire of Charles the Great. " It was the mailed feudal horse- 
man and the impregnable walls of the feudal castle that foiled the 
attacks of the Danes, the Saracens, and the Hungarians " (Oman). 
Feudalism rendered another noteworthy service to society in 
fostering among its privileged members self-reliance and love 
of personal independence. Turbulent, violent, and refractory as 
was the feudal aristocracy of Europe, it performed the grand 
service of keeping alive during the later mediaeval period the 

spirit of liberty. 
The feudal lords 
would not allow 
themselves to be 
dealt with arro- 
gantly by their 
king; they stood 
on their rights as 
freemen. Hence 
royalty was pre- 
vented from be- 
coming as despotic 
as would otherwise 
have been the case. 
Thus in England, 
for instance, the 
feudal lords held 
Fig. 15. — Group IN THE Manor House. (Froma g^ch tyrannical 
tapestry of the fourteenth century ; after Green) -^ 

^ ^ rulers as King 

John in check (sec. 210), until such time as the yeoman and 
the burgher were bold enough and strong enough alone to resist 
their despotically inclined sovereigns. In France, where, unfor- 
tunately, the power of the feudal nobles was broken too soon, 
— before the burghers, the Third Estate, were prepared to take 
up the struggle for liberty, — the result was the growth of that 




CHIVAtRY DEFINED 93 

autocratic, despotic royalty which led the French people to the 
Revolution and the Reign of Terror. 

Another of the good effects of feudahsm was the impulse it 
gave to certain forms of polite literature. Just as learning and 
philosophy were fostered by the seclusion of the cloister, so were 
poetry and romance fostered by the open and joyous hospitalities 
of the baronial hall. The castle door was always open to the 
wandering singer and story-teller, and it was amidst the scenes 
of festivity within that the ballads and romances of mediaeval min- 
strelsy and literature had their birth. « It is to the feudal times," 
says Guizot, " that we trace back the earliest literary monuments 
of England, France, and Germany, the earliest intellectual enjoy- 
ments of modern Europe." 

Still another service which feudalism rendered to civilization 
was the development within the baronial castle of those ideas 
and sentiments — among others a nice sense of honor and an 
exalted consideration for woman — which found their noblest 
expression in chivalry, of which institution and its good effects 
upon the social life of Europe we shall now proceed to speak. 

11. Chivalry • 

102. Chivalry defined; Origin of the Institution. — Chivalry has 
been aptly defined as the " Flower of Feudalism." It was a mili- 
tary institution or order, the members of which, called knights, 
were pledged to the protection of the Church and to the defense 
of the weak and the oppressed. 

The germ out of which chivalry developed seems to have been 
the body of vassal horsemen which Charles Martel created to 
repel the raids of the Saracens into Aquitaine^ (sec. 96). It was 
in these border wars that the Franks learned from the Arab 
Moors '' to put their trust in horses." From South France this 
new military system, in which mounted armor-clad warriors largely 

8 See Brunner, " Der Reiterdienst und die Anfange des Lehnwesens " in his For- 
schungen zur Geschichte des deutschen tmd franzosischen Rechtes (Stuttgart, 1894). 
This important study is of the nature of a discovery respecting the beginnings, or 
rather the development, of the fief system and of chivalry. 



94 



FEUDALISM AND' CHIVALRY 



superseded the earlier foot soldiers, spread over Europe. The 
development was closely connected with that of feudalism ; in- 
deed, it was the military side of that development. It became the 
rule that all fief holders must render military service on horseback. 
Fighting on horseback gradually became the normal mode and for 
centuries remained so. 

Gradually this feudal warrior caste underwent a transforma- 
tion. It became in part independent of the feudal system, in so 
far as that had to do with the land, so that any person, if quaHfied 
by birth and properly initiated, might be a member of the order 
without being the holder of a fief. A great part of the later 
knights were portionless sons of the nobility. 

At the same time the religious spirit of the period entered 
into the order, and it became a Christian brotherhood, some- 
what like the order of the priesthood. Thus, Kke all other 
mediaeval institutions, chivalry resulted from a union of various 
elements. Its military forms, spirit, and virtues came from the 
side of feudalism; its religious forms, spirit, and virtues, from 
the side of the Church. What actually took place is best illus- 
trated by those military orders of monks, the Knights Templars 
and Knights Hospitalers (sec. 143), which came into existence 
during the Crusades. But notwithstanding their monastic vows 
of celibacy and poverty, we probably shall not be wrong if we 
regard these monk-knights as the virtual descendants of those 
warriors to whom Charles Martel gave fiefs and whom he put on 
horses to repel the plundering incursions of the " swift Moors." 

103. Its Universality; the Church and Chivalry. — As France 
was the cradle, so was it the true home, of chivalry. Yet its 
influence was felt everywhere and in everything. It colored all 
the events and enterprises of the latter half of the Middle Ages. 
The literature of the period is instinct with its spirit. The Cru- 
sades, the greatest undertakings of the mediaeval ages, were 
primarily enterprises of the Christian chivalry of Europe; for 
chivalry had then come under the tutelage of the Church. In 
the year 1095 the Council of Clermont, which assembly formally 
inaugurated the First Crusade, decreed that every person of noble 



TRAINING OF THE KNIGHT 



95 



birth, on attaining the age of twelve, should take a solemn oath 
before a bishop " that he would defend to the uttermost the 
oppressed, the widow, and the orphan ; and that women of noble 
birth should enjoy his special care." 

104. Training of the Knight. — When chivalry had once 
become established, all the sons of the nobility, save such as 
were to enter the holy orders of the Church, were set apart and 
disciplined for its service. The sons of the poorer nobles were 
usually placed in the family of some lord of renown and wealth, 
whose castle became a sort of school, where they were trained 
in the duties and exercises of knighthood. 

This education began at the early age of seven, the youth bear- 
ing the name of page or varlet until he attained the age of four- 
teen, when he acquired the title of squire, or esquire. The lord 
and his knights trained the boys in manly and martial duties, while 
the ladies of the castle instructed them in the duties of religion 
and in all knightly etiquette. The duties of the page were usu- 
ally confined to the castle, though sometimes he accompanied 
his lord to the field. The esquire always attended in battle the 
knight to whom 
he was attached, 
carrying his arms 
and, if need be, 
engaging in the 
fight. 

105. The Cere- 
mony of Knight- 
ing. — At the age 
of twenty-one the 
squire became a 
knight, being then 
introduced to the order of knighthood by a pecuhar and impressive 
service. After a long fast and vigil the candidate listened to a 
lengthy sermon on his duties as a knight. Then kneeling, as 
in the feudal ceremony of homage, before the lord conducting 
the services, he vowed to defend religion and the ladies, to 




Fig. 16. — Arming a Knight. (From a manu- 
script of the thirteenth century ; after Lacroix) 



96 



FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 



succor the distressed, and ever to be faithful to his compan- 
ion knights. His arms were now given to him, and his sword 
was girded on, when the lord, striking him with the flat of his 
sword on the shoulders, said, " In the name of God, of St. 
Michael, and of St. George, I dub thee knight ; be brave, bold, 
and loyal." 

1 06. The Tournament. — The tournament was the favorite 
amusement of the age of chivalry. It was a mimic battle between 
two companies of noble knights, armed usually with pointless 
swords or blunted lances. In the universal esteem in which the 
participants were held, it reminds us of the sacred games of the 




Fig. 17. — A Tilting Match between Two Knights. (From 
an engraving) 



Greeks; while in the fierce and sanguinary character it some- 
times assumed, it recalls the gladiatorial combats of the Roman 
amphitheater. 

The prince or baron giving the festival made wide proclama- 
tion of the event, brave and distinguished knights being invited 
even from distant lands to grace the occasion with their pres- 
ence and an exhibition of their skill and prowess. The lists — a 
level space marked off by a rope or railing, and surrounded with 



CHARACTER OF THE KNIGHT 



97 



galleries for spectators — were made gay with banners and tapes- 
tries and heraldic emblems. 

When the moment arrived for the opening of the ceremony, 
heralds proclaimed the rules of the contest, whereupon the combat- 
ants advanced into the Hsts, each knight displaying upon his helmet 
or breast the device of the mistress of his affections. At the given 
signal the opposing parties of knights, with couched lances, rode 
fiercely at each other. Victory was accorded to him who unhorsed 
his antagonist or broke in a proper manner the greatest number of 
lances. The guerdon of the victor was a wreath of flowers, armor, 
greyhounds, or steeds decked with knightly trappings, and, more 
esteemed than all 
else, the praises and 
favor of his lady- 
love. 

The joust dif- 
fered from the tour- 
nament in being an 
encounter between 
two knights only, 
and in being at- 
tended with less 
ceremony. 

107. Character 
of the Knight. — 
Chivalric loyalty to 
the mistress of his 
supreme affection 
was the first article 
in the creed of the 
true knight. "He 
who was faithful 

and true to his lady," says Hallam, "was held sure of salvation 
in the theology of castles, though not of Christians." He must 
also be gentle, brave, courteous, truthful, pure, generous, hospi- 
table, faithful to his engagements, and ever ready to risk life 




Fig. 18. — Degradation of a Knight. (Frag- 
ment of a woodcut dated 1 565 ; after Lacroix) 



98 FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

and limb in the cause of religion and in defense of his com- 
panions in arms. 

But these were the virtues and quahfications of the ideal 
knight. It is needless to say that, though there were many who 
illustrated all these virtues in their blameless lives and romantic 
enterprises, there were too many who were knights only in profes- 
sion. " An errant knight," as an old writer puns, with too much 
truth, " was an arrant knave." Another writer says, " Deeds that 
would disgrace a thief, and acts of cruelty that would have dis- 
gusted a Hellenic tyrant or a Roman emperor, were common 
things with knights of the highest lineage." 

But cruelty, treachery, untruthfulness, cowardice, baseness, 
and crime of every sort were opposed to the true spirit of chiv- 
alry ; and the knight who was convicted of such faults could be 
punished by expulsion from the order of knighthood, by what 
was known as the Ceremony of Degradation. In this ceremony 
the spurs of the offending knight were struck off from his heels 
with a heavy cleaver, his sword was broken, and his horse's tail cut 
off. Then the disgraced knight was dressed in a burial robe, and 
the usual funeral ceremonies were performed over him, signifying 
that he was "dead to the honots of knighthood." 

1 08. Decline of Chivalry. — The fifteenth century was the 
evening of chivalry. The decline of the system resulted from 
the operation of the same causes that effected the overthrow of 
feudalism. The changes in the mode of warfare which helped to 
do away with the feudal baron and his mail-clad retainers likewise 
tended to destroy knight-errantry. And then as civilization 
advanced, new feelings and sentiments began to claim the atten- 
tion and to work upon the imagination of men. Persons ambitious 
of distinction began to seek it in other ways than by adventures of 
chivahy. Governments, too, became more regular, and the in- 
creased order and security of society rendered less needful the serv- 
ices of the gallant knight in behaff of the weak and the oppressed. 

In a word, the extravagant performances of the knight-errant 
carried into a practical and commercial age -^ an age very differ- 
ent from that which gave birth to chivalry — became fantastic and 



THE EVIL AND THE GOOD IN CHIVALRY 99 

ridiculous ; and when, finally, early in the seventeenth century, the 
genial Spanish satirist Cervantes wrote his famous Don Quixote, 
in which work he leads his hero knight into all sorts of absurd 
adventures, such as running a tilt against a windmill, which his 
excited imagination had pictured to be a monstrous giant flour- 
ishing his arms with some wicked intent, everybody, struck with 
the infinite absurdity of the thing, fell a-laughing ; and amidst 
the fitting accompaniment of smiles and broad pleasantries the 
knight-errant took his departure from the world.® 

109. The Evil and the Good in Chivalry. — The system of 
chivalry had many vices, chief among which were its aristocratic, 
exclusive tendencies. Dr. Arnold, indignant among other things 
at the knights' forgetfulness or disregard of the brotherhood of 
man, exclaims bitterly, " If I were called upon to name what 
spirit of evil predominantly deserved the name of Antichrist, 
I should name the Spirit of Chivalry." And another indignant 
writer declares that " it is not probable that the knights supposed 
they could be guilty of injustice to the lower classes." These 
were regarded with indifference or contempt, and considered as 
destitute of any claims upon those of noble birth as were beasts 
of burden or the game of the chase. It is always the young and 
beautiful woman of gentle birth whose wrongs the valiant knight 
is risking- his life to avenge, always the smiles of the queen of 
love and beauty for which he is spHntering his lance in the fierce 
tournament. The fostering of this aristocratic spirit was one of the 
most serious faults of chivalry. Yet we must bear in mind that 
this fault should be charged to the age rather than to the knight. 

But to speak of the beneficial, refining influences of chivalry, 
we should say that it undoubtedly contributed powerfully to lift 
that sentiment of respect for the gentler sex which characterized 
all the iiorthern nations, into that tender veneration of woman 
which forms the distinguishing characteristic of the present age, 
and makes it differ from all preceding phases of civiHzation. 

9 That is, from the world of romantic literature ; for the satire of Cervantes was 
aimed at the extravagances of the romancers of his times. (Recall Spenser's The 
Faery Queene.) There were not many real knights-errant when Cervantes wrote. 



lOO FEUDALISM AND CHIVALRY 

Again, chivalry did much to create that ideal of character — 
an ideal distinguished by the virtues of courtesy, gentleness, 
humanity, loyalty, magnanimity, and fidelity to the plighted 
word — which we rightly think to surpass any ever formed 
under the influences of antiquity. Just as Christianity gave to 
the world an ideal manhood which it was to strive to realize, 
so did chivalry hold up an ideal to which men were to conform 
their lives. Men, indeed, have never perfectly realized either 
the ideal of Christianity or that of chivalry; but the influence 
which these two ideals have had in shaping and giving character 
to the lives of men cannot be overestimated. Together, through 
the enthusiasm and effort awakened for their realization, they 
have produced a new type of manhood, which we indicate by the 
phrase " a knightly and Christian character." 

Selections from the Sources. — Translations and Reprints, vol. iii, No. 5, 
" English Manorial Documents," and vol. iv, No. 3, " Documents Illustra- 
tive of Feudalism" (both ed. by Edward P. Cheyney). Robinson, Readings 
in European History, vol. i, chap. ix. 

Secondary Works. — Emerton, Introductiojt to the Middle Ages, chap, xv ; 
and MedicBval Europe, chap, xiv and the first part of chap. xv. Adams, 
Civilization during the Middle Ages, chap. ix. Seignobos, The Feudal 
Regime. Bemont and Monod, Mediceval Europe, chap. xvi. Seebohm, 
The English Village Community. This is the most noteworthy work in 
our language on the subject with which it deals. The author seeks the 
origin of the English manor in the Roman villa with its servile population, 
thus making EngHsh history begin with servitude and not with freedom. 
Cheyney, An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of Eng- 
land, chap, ii, "Rural Life and Organization." Munro and Sellery, 
Mediceval Civilization, pp. 1 59-2 11 and 240-247. CUTTS, Scenes and Char- 
acters of the Middle Ages, pp. 311-460, "Knights of the Middle Ages." 
Lacroix, Military and Religious Life. Consult Table of Contents. 
James, History of Chivalry. CORNISH, Chivalry. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Life of the serfs on a mediaeval manor. 
2. The open-field system of cultivation. See Seebohm. 3. Description of 
a feudal castle. 4. Life in the castle. 5. A tournament. 6. Legend of 
the Holy Grail. 




^mm:m^^^siz^^. 



Fig, 19. — Landing in England of William of Normandy 
(From the Bayeux tapestry) 



CHAPTER X 
THE NORMANS 

I. The Normans at Home and in Italy 

no. Introductory. — The history of the Normans — the name, 
it will be recalled, of the transformed Scandinavians who settled 
in Northern Gaul (sec. S6) — is simply a continuation of the 
story of the Northmen; and nothing could better illustrate the 
difference between the period we have left behind and the one 
upon which we have entered, nothing could more strikingly 
exhibit the gradual transformation that has crept over the face 
and spirit of European society, than the transformation which 
time and favoring associations have wrought in these men. 
When first we met them in the ninth century they were pagans ; 
now they are Christians. Then they were rough, wild, merciless 
corsairs ; now they are become the most cultured, pohshed, and 
chivalrous people in Europe. But the restless, daring spirit that 
drove the Norse sea kings forth upon the waves in quest of 
adventure and booty still stirs in the breasts of their descend- 
ants. As has been said, they were simply changed from heathen 
Vikings, delighting in the wild life of sea rover and pirate, into 
Christian knights, eager for pilgrimages and crusades. 

It is these men, uniting in their character the strength, inde- 
pendence, and daring of the Scandinavian with the vivacity, 
imagination, and culture of the Romano-Gaul, that we are now 



I02 THE NORMANS 

to follow, as from their seats in France they go forth to make 
fresh conquests, — to build up a kingdom in the Mediterranean 
lands, and to set a line of Norman kings upon the EngHsh throne. 
Later, in following the fortunes of the crusaders, we shall meet 
them on the battlefields of Palestine, there winning renown as 
the most valiant knights of Christendom. 

111. The Dukes of Normandy. — Under Rollo (sec. 86) and his 
immediate successors — William Longsword (927-943), Richard 
the Fearless (943-996), and Richard the Good (996-1027) — 
the power of the Normans in France became gradually consoli- 
dated. The country of Normandy grew more populous, both 
through the natural increase of the population at home and the 
arrival of fresh bands of Scandinavians from the Northern coun- 
tries. Finally, after more than one hundred years had passed, 
years for the most part of uneventful yet steady growth and de- 
velopment, the old Norse spirit of adventure revived, and Southern 
Europe and England became the scene of the daring and brilliant 
exploits of the Norman warriors. 

112. The Normans in Italy and Sicily. — The Normans secured 
a foothold in Southern Italy in the early part of the eleventh 
century, some Httle time before the conquest of England. Their 
superior fighting quahties had led to their services being sought 
after by the Christian rulers of that region in their constant feuds 
with each other, and particularly in their warfare against the Mos- 
lems, who at that time were in possession of the island of Sicily, 
and were constantly troubhng the neighboring shores of Italy. 

From the position of guests and mercenaries the Norman 
knights soon rose to that of masters and rulers. They got pos- 
session finally of all Southern Italy and of Sicily, and built up in 
these southern lands a prosperous state,, which came to be known 
as the Kingdom of Naples or the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily, 
and which lasted, although with many changes of dynasties, until 
the political unification of Italy in our own day. 

The most celebrated of the Norman leaders during this period 
of conquest and organization was Robert Guiscard (d. 1085), a 
character only less celebrated than the renowned WiUiam the 



THE NORMAN CONQUEST OF ENGLAND 103 

Conqueror, of whom we shall come to speak presently. His 
entire career was one series of daring and adventurous exploits, 
which spread the renown of the Norman name throughout the 
Mediterranean lands. 

One of the most important consequences of the creation of 
this new Norman state in the south was its effect upon the 
Crusades, to the eve of which we have now come. These Nor- 
man rulers built up a strong maritime power, which had the great 
port of Amalfi as its center, and, with the help of the fleets of 
Genoa, Pisa, and Venice, cleared the Middle Mediterranean of 
Saracen corsairs, thus opening up for the coming crusaders a 
water route to the Holy Land. 

II. The Norman Conquest of England 

113. Events leading up to the Conquest. — The conquest of Eng- 
land by the Normans was the most important of their enterprises, 
and one followed by consequences of the greatest magnitude, not 
only to the conquered people, but indirectly to the world. 

In the year 1035 the duke of the Normans, known as Robert 
the Magnificent (102 7-1035), died in Asia Minor, while on his 
way home from a romantic pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and his 
son William, the destined conqueror of England, became Duke 
of Normandy. William was at this time only seven years of age. 
The cruelty with which he, while yet a mere boy, punished those 
of his enemies that had especially awakened his resentment indi- 
cated the stern and unrelenting character of the man whom 
destiny had selected to play a most important part in the history 
of the eleventh century. 

The situation of affairs in England at this time was this. In 
the year 1066 Edward the Confessor, in whose person, it will be 
recalled, the old English line was restored after the Danish usurpa- 
tion (sec. 85), died, and immediately the Witan,^ in accordance 

1 The Witan, or Witenagemot, which means the " Meeting of the Wise Men," 
was the common council of the realm. The House of Lords of the present Parliar 
ment is a survival of this early national assembly. 



104 '^HE NORMANS 

with the dying wish of the king, chose Harold, Earl of Wessex, 
the best and strongest man in all England, to be his successor. 

When the news of the action of the Witan and of Harold's 
acceptance of the English crown was carried across the Channel 
to William, he was really or feignedly transported with rage. He 
declared that Edward, who was his cousin, had during his life- 
time promised the throne to him, and that Harold had assented 
to this, and by solemn oath engaged to sustain him. He now 
demanded of Harold that he surrender to him the usurped throne, 
threatening the immediate invasion of the island in case he 
refused. King Harold answered the demand by expelling from 
the country the Normans who had followed Edward into the 
kingdom, and by collecting an army for the defense of his 
dominions. Duke William now made ready for a descent upon 
the English coast. 

114. The Battle of Hastings (1066). — The Norman army of 
invasion landed in the south of England, at the port of Hastings, 
which place gave name to the battle that almost immediately 
followed, — the battle that was to determine the fate of England. 
It was begun by a horseman riding out from the Norman lines 




Fig. 20. — Battle of Hastings. (From the Bayeux tapestry) 

and advancing alone toward the English army, tossing up his 
sword and skillfully catching it as it fell, and singing all the while 
the stirring battle song of Charlemagne and Roland. The English 
watched with astonishment this exhibition of " careless dexterity," 
and if they did not contrast the vivacity and nimbleness of the 
Norman foe with their own heavy and clumsy manners, others at 
least have not failed to do so for them. 



^THE COMPLETION OF THE CONQUEST 105 

The battle once joined, the conflict was long and terrific. 
The day finally went against the Enghsh. Harold fell, pierced 
through the eye by an arrow ; and William was master of the 

field (1066). 

115. The Completion of the Conquest (1067-1070). — William 
now marched upon London, and at Westminster, on Christmas 
Day, 1066, was crowned and anointed king of England; but he 
was yet far from being such in fact. The most formidable resist- 
ance made to the Conqueror was in the nortli, where the popu- 
lation was composed chiefly of Danes, who were aided by their 
kinsmen from Denmark. To protect himself on this side, William 
finally ravaged all the country between the Humber and the 
Tees, converting it into an uninhabitable desert. More than a 
quarter of a century afterwards the desolated district was marked 
by untilled fields and the charred ruins of hamlets and towns. 
One hundred thousand people, deprived of food and shelter, 
perished miserably during the unusually severe winter following 
the cruel act. 

116. The Distribution of the Land and the Gemot of Salisbury. 
— Almost the first act of William after he had established his 
power in England was to fiilfill his promise to the nobles who had 
aided him in his enterprise, by distributing among them the unre- 
deemed 2 estates of the Enghsh who had fought at Hastings in 
defense of their king and country. 

Profiting by the lesson taught by the wretched condition of 
France, which country was kept in a state of constant turmoil by 
a host of feudal chiefs and lords, many of whom were almost or 
quite as powerful as the king himself (sec. 100), William took care 
that in the distribution no feudatory should receive an entire shire, 
save in two or three exceptional cases. To the great lord to whom 
he must needs give a large fief, he granted not a continuous tract 
of land, but several estates or manors scattered in different parts 

2 « When the lands of all those who had fought for Harold were confiscated, 
those who were willing to acknowledge William were allowed to redeem theirs, 
either paying money at once or giving hostages for the payment " (Stubbs, Const, 
Hist., vol. i, p. 258). As many as 20,000 Saxon proprietors in all are said to have 
been dispossessed by as many Norman followers of William. 



I06 THE NORMANS 

of the country, in order that there might be no dangerous con- 
centration of property or power in the hands of the vassal. 

Another equally important limitation of the power of the vassal 
was effected by William through his requiring all fief holders, great 
and small, to take an oath of fealty directly to him as overlord. 
This was a great innovation upon feudal custom, for the rule was 
that the vassal should swear fealty to his own immediate lord only, 
and in war follow his banner even against his own king. The 
oath that William exacted from every fief holder made the alle- 
giance which he owed to his king superior to that which he owed 
to his own immediate lord. At the great gemot or military 
assembly of Salisbury in the year 1086 "all the landholders of 
substance in England" swore to William this solemn oath of 
superior fealty and allegiance. 

William also denied to his feudatories the right of coining 
money and making laws; and by other wise restrictions upon 
their power, subordinating, for instance, all the baronial courts to 
the jurisdiction of the royal judges, he saved England from those 
endless contentions and petty wars that were distracting almost 
every other country of Europe. 

To overawe the dispossessed people, William now built and 
garrisoned fortresses or towers in all the principal cities of the 
realm. The celebrated Tower of London and the great black, 
massive tower still standing in the city of Newcastle were built 
by him, and are impressive memorials of the days of the Con- 
quest. His nobles also erected strong castles upon their lands, so 
that the whole country fairly bristled with these fortified private 
residences. With the towns dominated by the great fortresses, and 
the open country watched over by the barons secure in their thick- 
walled castles, the Normans, though vastly inferior in numbers to 
the conquered Saxons, were able to hold them in perfect subjection. 

117. Domesday Book. — One of the most celebrated acts of 
the Conqueror was the making of Domesday Book. This famous 
book contained a description and valuation of all the lands of 
England, — excepting those of some counties, mostly in the north, 
that were either unconquered or unsettled; an enumeration of 



THE CURFEW AND THE FOREST LAWS 



107 



the cattle and sheep; and statements of the income of every 
man. It was intended, in a word, to be a perfect survey and 
census of the entire kingdom. 

The commissioners who went through the land to collect the 
needed information for the work were often threatened by the 
people, who resented this " prying into their affairs," and looked 
upon the whole thing as simply another move preparatory to fresh 
taxation. But notwithstanding the bitter feelings with which the 
English viewed the preparation of the work, it was certainly a wise 
and necessary 
measure, and one 
prom pted by 
statesmanlike 
motives. 

118. The Cur- 
few and the Forest 
Laws. — Among 
the regulations 
introduced into 
England by the 
Conqueror was 
the peculiar one 
known as the Cur- 
few bell. This law 
required that, 
upon the ringing of the church bell at nightfall, every person 
should be at home, and that the fires should be buried ^ and the 
lights extinguished. 

Two reasons have been assigned for this ordinance : the one 
supposes that its object was to prevent the people's assembling 
by night to plan or execute treasonable undertakings ; the other 
represents it simply as a safeguard against fire. The law was cer- 
tainly in force in Normandy before the Conquest ; indeed, accord- 
ing to Palgrave, it was a universal custom of police throughout 
the whole of mediaeval Europe. 

8 Hence the term Curfew, from couvrir, to cover, and_;^«, fire. 




Fig. 21. — Domesday Book. (From a facsimile 
edition published by royal command in 1862) 

There are two large volumes of the survey, one being a 
folio of 760 pages and the other a large octavo of 900 
pages. The strong box shown in the cut is the chest 
in which the volumes were formerly kept 



I08 THE NORMANS 

Less justifiable and infinitely more odious to the people were 
the Forest Laws of the Normans. The Normans were excessively 
fond of the chase. WiUiam had for the sport a perfect passion. 
An old chronicler declares that " he loved the tall deer as if he 
were their father." Extensive tracts of country were turned into 
forests by the destruction of the farmhouses and villages. More 
than fifty hamlets, and numerous churches, are said to have been 
destroyed in the creation of what was known as the New Forest.* 

The game in these forests was protected by severe laws. To 
kill a deer was a greater crime than to kill a man. Several mem- 
bers of the Conqueror's family were killed while hunting in these 
royal preserves, and the people declared that these misfortunes 
were the judgment of Heaven upon the cruelty of their founder. 

119. The Norman Successors of the Conqueror (i 087-11 54), — 
For nearly three quarters of a century after the death of William 
the Conqueror, England was ruled by Norman kings. Three 
names span this long period, — William II, known as Rufus, or 
the Red (1087—1100); Henry I, surnamed Beauclerc, or the 
"good scholar" (1100— 1135); and Stephen of Blois (1135— 
IT 54), a grandson of the Conqueror. 

Notwithstanding the many oppressive laws and cruel acts that 
marked the reigns of the sons of the great duke, — ■ William and 
Henry, — England flourished under their rule; commerce and 
the various industries were steadily progressing, and the Normans 
and the English, forgetting their mutual enmities, were gradually 
blending into a single people. 

But upon the death of Henry a dispute as to the succession 
arose between his daughter Matilda and Stephen of Blois. For 
several years the realm was wasted by civil war. Eventually a cov- 
enant was made between the contending parties whereby it was 
agreed that Stephen should hold the crown undisturbed during 
his life, but that at his death it should go to the son of Matilda. 
The year following this arrangement Stephen died, and the crown 

•* The term forest as applied to these hunting parks does not necessarily mean 
& continuous wooded tract, but simply untilled ground left to grow up to weeds and 
shrubs as a covert for game. 



RESULTS OF THE NORMAN CONQUEST 109 

was placed, according to the treaty, upon the head of Henry 
of Anjou, who thus became the founder of the dynasty of the 
Angevins, or Plantagenets "(11 54). 

120. Results of the Norman Conquest. — The most important 
and noteworthy result of the Conquest was the establishment in 
England of a strong centralized government. This came about not 
only through the monarchical views of government brought in by 
the Norman kings and the modification of feudal rules and practices 
effected by the Conqueror, but also through the wholesome lessons 
impressed upon the minds of the people by the intolerable anarchy 
of Stephen's reign. England now became a real kingdom, — what 
it had hardly been in more than semblance before. 

A second result of the Conquest was the founding of a new 
feudal aristocracy. The Saxon thane was displaced by the Nor- 
man baron. This not only introduced a new and more refined 
element into the social life of England, but it also changed the 
membership, the temper, and the name of the national assembly, 
the old English Witan now becoming the Parliament of later times. 
,A third result of the Conquest was the drawing of England 
into closer relations with the countries of continental Europe. 
The Norman Conquest was in this respect like the Roman con- 
quest of the island. Through the many continental relations — 
political, social, commercial, and ecclesiastical — now established 
or made more intimate, England's advance in trade, in architec- 
ture, in her religious and intellectual life, was greatly promoted. 
And in this connection must be borne in mind particularly the 
close political and feudal relations into which England was 
brought with France, for out of these grew the jealousies and 
rivalries which led to the long Hundred Years' War between the 
two countries.^ 

Selections from the Sources. — The Bayeux Tapestry. (Reproduced in 
autotype plates with historic notes by Frank Rede Fowke, London, 1875.) 
This is a strip of linen canvas over two hundred feet long and nineteen 
inches wide, upon whicli are embroidered in colors seventy-two pictures, 

5 For the effects of the Conquest upon the English language and literature, see 
sees. 226 and 227. 



no THE NORMANS 

representing episodes in the Norman conquest of England. The work 
was executed not long after the events it depicts, and is named from the 
cathedral in France where it is kept. Its importance consists in the infor- 
mation it conveys respecting the life and manners, and the costumes, arms, 
and armor of the times. Lee, Source-Book, pp. 111-129. Kendall, 
Sottrce-Book, chap, iii, " Norman England." 

Secondary Works. — Freeman, The Norman Conquest. This is a 
little book which contains " the same tale told afresh," that fills the six 
volumes of the author's earlier great work on the Norman Conquest, 
Also by the same author, William the Conqueror. Johnson, The Nor- 
mans in Europe. Creasy, Decisive Battles of the World., chap, vii, " The 
Battle of Hastings, a.d. 1066." Green, The Conquest of England, chap. x. 
Jewett, The Story of the Normans, chap, vii, " The Normans in Italy." 
For life, culture, and manners : Traill, Social England, vol. i, chap, iii ; 
and Bateson, Mediceval England. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Robert Guiscard. 2. The Bayeux tap- 
estry. 3. Domesday Book. 4. The Curfew. 5. The " forests " and forest 
laws of the Norman kings. 



CHAPTER XI 
THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 

121. The Two World Powers. — "The two great ideas," says 
James Bryce, " which expiring antiquity bequeathed to the ages 
that followed were those of a world monarchy and a world reli- 
gion." We have seen how out of one of these ideas, under the 
favoring circumstances of the earher mediaeval centuries, was 
developed the Empire, and out of the other the Papacy. The 
history of these two powers, of their relations to the rulers and 
the peoples of Europe, and of their struggle with each other for 
supremacy, makes up a large part of the history of the mediaeval 
centuries. It is of these important matters that we must now 
try to get some sort of understanding. 

What we have learned about the ideas and principles of feu- 
dalism will aid us greatly in our study, for, as we shall see, the whole 
long struggle between these two world powers was deeply marked 
by feudal conceptions and practices. 

122. The Three Theories respecting the Relations of Pope and 
Emperor. — After the revival of the Empire in the West and the 
rise of the Papacy, there gradually grew up three different theories 
in regard to the divinely constituted relation of the "world king " 
and the "world priest." The first was that Pope and Emperor 
were each independently commissioned by God, the first to rule 
the spirits of men, the second to rule their bodies. Each reign- 
ing thus by original divine right, neither is set above the other, 
but both are to cooperate and to help each other. The special 
duty of the temporal power is to maintain order in the world 
and to be the protector of the Church. The Emperor bears the 
sword for the purpose of executing the decrees of the Church 
against all heretics and disturbers of its peace and unity. Thus 



112 



THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 



this theory looked to a perfect and beautiful alliance between 
Church and State, a double sovereignty emblemized in the dual 
nature of Christ. 

The second theory, the one held by the imperial party, was 
that the Emperor was superior to the Pope in secular affairs. 
Arguments from Scripture and from the transactions of history 
were not wanting to support this view of the relation of the 

two world powers. Thus Christ's 
payment of tribute money was 
cited as proof that he regarded 
the temporal power as superior 
to the spiritual. And then, did 
he not say, " Render unto Caesar 
the things which are Caesar's"? 
Further, the gifts of Pippin and 
Charles the Great to the Roman 
see made the popes, it was main- 
tained, the vassals of the em- 
perors. 

The third theory, the one held 
by the papal party, maintained 
that the ordained relation of the 
two powers" was the subordina- 
tion of the temporal to the spirit- 
ual authority, even in civil affairs. 
This view was maintained by such 
texts of Scripture as these: 
" But he that is spiritual judgeth 
all things, yet he himself is 
judged of no man";^ "See, I have this day set thee over the 
nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and 
to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant." ^ The con- 
ception was further illustrated by such comparisons as the follow- 
ing, — for in mediaeval times parable and metaphor often took the 
place of argument: As God has set in the heavens two lights, 

1 I Corinthians ii. 15. 2 Jeremiah i. 10. 




Fig. 22. — The Spiritual and 
THE Temporal Power. (From 
a ninth-century mosaic in the 
Lateran at Rome ; after Jaeger, 
Weltgesch ich te) 

St. Peter gives to Pope Leo III the 
stola and to Charlemagne the banner 
of Rome as symbols of the spiritual 
and temporal power. The portrait of 
Charlemagne here shown is with little 
doubt the oldest in existence 



THE RESTORATION OF THE PAPACY 113 

the sun and the moon, so has he established on earth two powers, 
the spiritual and the temporal ; but as the moon is inferior to the 
sun and receives its light from it, so is the Emperor inferior to 
the Pope and receives all power from him.^ Again, the two 
authorities were likened to the soul and the body ; as the former 
rules over the latter, so is it ordered that the spiritual power shall 
rule over and subject the temporal. 

The first theory was the impracticable dream of lofty souls who ■ 
forgot that men are human. Christendom was virtually divided 
into two hostile camps the members of which were respectively 
supporters of the imperial and the papal theory. The most inter- 
esting and instructive chapters of mediaeval history after the tenth 
century are those that record the struggles between Pope and 
Emperor, springing from their efforts to reduce to practice and 
fact these irreconcilable theories. 

123. The Restoration of the Papacy. — The great struggle 
between the emperors and the popes began in the eleventh cen- 
tury. The contest was preluded by the revival and strengthening 
of both the Empire and the Papacy. It will be recalled how the 
Empire, after the very idea of it had almost faded from the minds 
of many, was restored by Otto the Great (sec. 80). A little more 
than a century later the Papacy was also revived and strengthened. 
This needs a word of explanation. 

Throughout the greater part of the tenth and almost all the 
first half of the eleventh century, the Papacy had been sunk in 
the deepest moral degradation. This deplorable state of things 
had been created largely by the interference in the papal elections 
— which were nominally in the hands of the Roman clergy and 
people — by rival feudal factions at Rome which set up and pulled 
down popes at will. Through such influences it often happened 
that persons of scandalous life were, through violence and bribery, 
elevated to the papal chair.* 

3 Dante, maintaining the rights of the Emperor, ruined the force of this com- 
parison by pointing out that while the moon often eclipses the sun, the sun never 
ecUpses the moon. 

4 Out of efforts to improve this state of things arose the Sacred College of Cardi- 
nals. 1 his body was definitely created by a decree of the Lateran Synod of 1059, 



114 THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 

The Papacy owed very largely its rescue from this deep deg- 
radation, and its liberation from this humiliating bondage, to 
the intervention of the imperial power. Among the emperors 
who did most to effect the moral regeneration of the Roman see 
was the Emperor Henry III (1039-105 6). Exercising his author- 
ity as the guardian and protector of the Church, he nominated 
for the holy office a series of religious-minded and strong men, 
who were filled with that spirit of reform which just now was 
issuing from the cloisters of the celebrated monastery of Cluny 
(sec. 31). 

124. Pope Gregory VII (107 3-1 085) and his Conception of the 
Papacy. — The most eminent of the reform popes was Pope 
Gregory VII, better known by his earlier name of Hildebrand, 
the most noteworthy character, after Charlemagne, that the 
Middle Ages produced. In the year 1049 he was brought from 
the cloisters of Cluny to Rome, where he became the maker and 
adviser of popes, and finally was himself elevated to the pontifical 
throne, which he held from 1073 to 1085. 

Gregory vehemently rejected the idea that the imperial power 
was superior to the papal, or even that the two were equal and 
coordinate. "The spiritual power was to stand related to the 
temporal as the sun to the moon, imparting light and strength, 
without, however, destroying it, or depriving princes of their 
sovereignty." In a word, Gregory's idea was that all the Chris- 
tian states should form a world empire, with the Pope at its head 
as God's representative on earth. 

In order to realize his grand ideal, Gregory, as soon as he 
became Pope, set about two important reforms, — the enforce- 
ment of celibacy among the secular clergy and the suppression 
of simony. Respecting each of these matters we must speak 
with some detail. 

•which acted under the inspiration of Pope Nicholas II. It was at first made up of 
the leading bishops, priests, and deacons connected with churches in and around 
Rome; later the members were chosen from a wider field. In 1585 the number of 
members of the college was fixed at seventy. Vacancies in the body are filled by the 
Pope. The college now possesses the exclusive right of electing a pope, although at 
first the inferior Roman clergy enjoyed the privilege of confirmation. This electoral 
board constitutes one of the most important institutions of the Catholic Church. 



GREGORY VII II5 

125. Gregory VII and the Celibacy of the Clergy. — When 
Gregory came to the papal throne one grave danger threatening 
the Church was the marriage of the clergy. From the very first 
there had prevailed two opposing views respecting the celibacy of 
the priesthood, some upholding the custom of clerical marriage, 
and others maintaining the superior sanctity of the unmarried 
state. In the eleventh century a great part of the minor clergy 
were married. One great injury to the Church which resulted 
from this was that it was introducing the feudal principle of 
heredity. The priests were coming to look upon their offices and 
the Church lands under their care as fiefs, which they had a right 
to transmit to their children. With the offices of the Church thus 
rendered hereditary, it is easy to see how the authority of the 
Pope over the clergy was being fatally impaired, 

Gregory resolved to bring all the clergy to the strict observ- 
ance of celibate vows. By thus separating the priests from the 
attachments of home, and lifting from them all family burdens 
and cares, he aimed to render their consecration to the duties of 
their offices more whole-souled and their dependence upon the 
Church more complete. 

We will here simply stop to observe that the reform, though 
most obstinately opposed by a large section of the clergy, was 
finally effected, — but not in Gregory's lifetime ; so that celibacy 
became as binding upon the priest as upon the monk. It can 
hardly be doubted that in many ways the reform increased 
the efficiency of the Catholic priesthood, and certainly greatly 
enhanced the influence and authority of the popes. 

126. Gregory VII and Simony. — -Gregory's second reform, 
the correction of simony, had for one of its ultimate objects the 
freeing of the lands and offices of the Church from the control of 
lay lords and princes, and the bringing of them more completely 
into the hands of the Roman bishop. 

The evil of simony^ had grown up in the Church chiefly in 
the following way. As the feudal system took possession of 

5 By simony is meant the purchase of an office in the Church, the name of the 
offense coming from Simon Magus, who offered Peter money for the power to confer 
the Holy Spirit. See Acts viii. 9-24. 



ii6 



THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 



European society, the Church, like individuals and cities, assumed 
feudal relations. Thus, as we have already seen, abbots and 
bishops, as the heads of monasteries and churches, for the sake 
of protection, became the vassals of powerful barons or princes. 
When once a prelate had promised fealty for his estates or tem- 
poralities, as they were called, these became henceforth a perma- 
nent fief of the overlord and subject to all the incidents of the 
feudal tenure. When a vacancy occurred the lord assumed the 
right to fill it, just as in case of the escheat of a lay fief.^ In this 
way the temporal rulers throughout Europe had come to exercise 
the right of nominating or confirming the election of almost all 
the great prelates of the Church. 

Now, these lay princes who had the patronage of these Church 
offices and lands handled them just as they did their lay fiefs. 

They required the person nomi- 
nated to an abbacy or to a bish- 
opric to pay for the appointment 
and investiture a sum propor- 
tioned to the income from the 
office. This was in strict accord 
with the feudal rule which allowed 
the lord to demand from the vas- 
sal, upon his investiture with a 
fief, a sum of money called a relief 
(sec. 94). This rule, thus applied 
to Church lands and offices, was, 
it is easy to see, the cause of 
great evil and corruption. The 
ecclesiastical vacancies were vir- 
tually sold to the highest bidder. 
And then, furthermore, the most 
unsuitable persons became bishops 
and abbots. The offices were given to favorites, to mere children, 
to persons often of the most notoriously evil life. 

6 The clergy and monks still retained the nominal right of election, but too fre- 
quently an election by them was a mere matter of form. For a typical case see sec. 164. 




Fig. 23. — Investiture of a 
Bishop by a King through 
THE Giving of the Crosier, 
OR Pastoral Staff. (From a 
manuscript of the tenth century) 



EXCOMMUNICATIONS AND INTERDICTS 117 

Such was the deplorable state into which the Church had been 
brought by the application of feudal principles to ecclesiastical 
lands and offices. The maintenance of the unity of the Church 
and the preservation of religion itself demanded that the control 
of these ecclesiastical positions and estates should be taken away 
from the lay rulers. 

To remedy the evil Gregory issued decrees forbidding any one 
of the clergy to receive the investiture of a bishopric or abbey or 
church from the hands of a temporal prince or lord. Any one 
who should dare to disobey these decrees was threatened with 
the penalties of the Church. 

127. Excommunications and Interdicts. — The principal instru- 
ments relied upon by Gregory for the carrying out of his decrees 
were the spiritual weapons of the Church, — Excommunication 
and Interdict. 

The first was directed against individuals. The person excom- 
municated was cut off from all relations with his fellow-men. If 
a king, his subjects were released from their oath of allegiance. 
Any one providing the excommunicate with food or shelter incurred 
the penalties of the Church. Living, the excommunicated person 
was to be shunned and abhorred as though tainted with an infec- 
tious disease ; and dead, he was to be refused the ordinary rites 
of burial. 

The interdict was directed against a city, province, or kingdom. 
Throughout the region under this ban the churches were closed ; 
no bell could be rung, no marriage celebrated, no burial ceremony 
performed. The sacraments of baptism and extreme unction alone 
could be administered. 

It is difficult for us in these modern skeptical times to realize 
the effect of these bans during the "Age of Faith." They rarely 
failed in bringing the most contumacious offender to a speedy and 
abject confession, or in effecting his undoing. This will appear in 
the following paragraph. 

128. The Investiture Contest; Emperor Henry IV' s Humiliation 
at Canossa (1077.) — It was in Germany that Gregory experienced 
the most formidable opposition to his reform measures. The 



Il8 THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 

Emperor elect, King Henry IV (1056-1106), — who had been 
threatened by the Pope with excommunication and deposition, — 
gathering in council such of the prelates of the Empire as would 
answer his call (1076), even dared to bid him descend from the 
papal throne. Gregory in turn gathered a council at Rome and 
deposed and excommunicated the Emperor. " In the name of 
Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," thus ran the solemn 
papal decree, " I withdraw through thy [St. Peter's] power and 
authority, from Henry the King, son of Henry the Emperor, who 
has arisen against thy Church with unheard-of insolence, the rule 
over the whole kingdom of the Germans and over Italy. And I 
absolve all Christians from the bond of the oatK which they have 
made or shall make to him; and I forbid any one to serve him 
as king." '^ 

Henry's deposition encouraged a revolt on the part of some of 
his discontented subjects. He was shunned as a man accursed by 
Heaven. His authority seemed to have slipped entirely out of his 
hands, and his kingdom was on the point of going to pieces. In 
this wretched state of his affairs there was but one thing for him 
to do, — to go to Gregory and humbly sue for pardon and rein- 
statement in the favor of the Church. 

Henry sought Gregory among the Apennines, at Canossa, a 
stronghold of the celebrated Countess Matilda of Tuscany. But 
Gregory refused to admit him to his presence. It was winter, and 
on three successive days the king, clothed in sackcloth, stood with 
bare feet in the snow of the courtyard of the castle, waiting for 
permission to kneel at the feet of the pontiff and to receive 
forgiveness. 

This was one of the most noteworthy transactions, in its moral 
significance, that the world had ever witnessed, — the Emperor 
of the Holy Roman Empire, the successor of the Caesars and of 
Charlemagne, a rejected penitent at the door of the Roman pontiff. 

On the fourth day the king was admitted to the presence of 
Gregory, and the sentence of excommunication was removed 
(1077). Henry had "stooped to conquer," for the victory was 

7 Henderson, Select Historical Documents, p. 377. 



CONCORDAT OF WORMS 119 

really his. He had forced absolution from an unwilling Pope, 
and this release from the Church's censure meant much then to 
Henry and his cause. 

Henry was now able to avenge his humiliation. He raised an 
army and descended upon Rome. The Normans, under Robert 
Guiscard (sec. 112), came to the Pope's defense. In the fighting 
and confusion which followed, Rome was reduced almost to ruins. 
Gregory was constrained to seek an asylum at Salerno, where he 
died in 1085. His last words were, " I have loved righteousness 
and hated iniquity, and therefore I die in exile." 

But the quarrel did not end here. It was taken up by the suc- 
cessors of Gregory, and Henry was again excommunicated. After 
maintaining a long struggle with the power of the Church, and 
with his own sons, who were incited to rebel against him, he 
finally died broken-hearted (tio6). For five years his body was 
denied burial in consecrated ground ; but at last the ban of the 
Church was removed, and it was laid to rest with fitting honors. 

129. Concordat of Worms (i 1 2 2) . — Henry's humiliation, though 
it purchased him a personal victory, gave a severe blow to the 
prestige of the imperial power. Nevertheless his successors main- 
tained the quarrel with the popes. The outcome of the matter, 
after many years of bitter contention, was the celebrated Con- 
cordat of Worms (1122). It was agreed that all bishops and 
abbots of the Empire, after free canonical election, should receive 
the ring and staff, the symbols of their spiritual jurisdiction, from 
the Pope, but that the Emperor should exercise the right of invest- 
iture by the touch of a scepter, the emblem of temporal rights 
and authority. This was a recognition by both parties that all 
spiritual authority emanates from the Church and all temporal 
authority from the State. It was a compromise, — "a rendering 
unto Caesar of the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the 
things that are God's." 

But however equal the compromise may at first blush appear, 
it was after all a moral victory for the Papacy. The Concordat 
rescued the Church from the grave danger of complete secular- 
ization ; for the triumph of the lay power in its contention would 



I20 THE PAPACY AND THE EMPIRE 

have made the Church a part of the constitution of the feudal 
empire and monarchy, just as the temple in ancient Greece and 
Rome was a part of the constitution of the city-state. 

We must here drop the story of the contentions of Pope and 
Emperor in order to watch the peoples of Europe as at the time 
we have now reached they undertake with surprising unanimity 
and enthusiasm the most remarkable enterprises in which they 
were ever engaged, — the Crusades, or Holy Wars. 

It was the prestige and strength which the Papacy had gained 
in its contest with the Empire which enabled the popes to exert 
such an influence in setting the Crusades in motion and in direct- 
ing them ; while at the same time it was these great enterprises 
which, reacting upon the Papacy, greatly aided the popes in 
realizing Gregory's ideal of making the papal authority supreme 
throughout Western Christendom. 

Selections from the Sources. — Dante, De Monarchia (trans, by Au- 
relia Henry). Dante's argument is this : first, he shows the need of a 
supreme temporal ruler ; second, he proves from history that the Roman 
Empire " was willed of God " ; and third, he argues that the authority of 
the Emperor comes direct from God and not from the Pope. The work 
is a most instructive illustration of mediaeval ideals and mediaeval reason- 
ing. Henderson, Select Historical Documents^ pp. 351— 409, "Decrees 
concerning Papal Elections and Documents relating to the Controversy 
over Investiture." 

Secondary Works. — Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire. This little 
work has become a classic. Bowden, Life and Pontificate of Gregory the 
Seventh. Lea, Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church. Chapter xiv 
is devoted to Gregory's reforms. Adams, Civilization during the Middle 
Ages, chap. x. Emerton, Mediceval Europe, chaps, vii and viii. Alzog, 
Universal Church History, vol. ii, pp. 253-336 and 481-510. Tout, The 
Empire and the Papacy. Stephens, Hildebrand and his Tii7ies. Vin- 
cent, The Age of Hildebrand ; earlier chapters. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Hildebrand and the monastery of Cluny. 
2. The Sacred College of Cardinals. 3. The Interdict. 4. The Emperor 
Henry IV at Canossa. 5. The Countess Matilda. 



CHAPTER XII 
THE CRUSADES (1096-1273) 

I. Preparation of Europe for the Crusades 

130. The Crusades defined ; their Place in Universal History. — 
The Crusades were great military expeditions carried on inter- 
mittently for two centuries by the Christian peoples of Europe 
for the purpose of rescuing from the hands of the Mohammedans 
the holy places of Palestine and maintaining in the East a Latin 
kingdom. Historians usually enumerate eight of these expedi- 
tions as worthy of special narration. Of these eight the first four 
are often designated the Principal Crusades and the remaining 
four the Minor Crusades. But besides these there were a chil- 
dren's crusade and several other expeditions, which, being insig- 
nificant in numbers or results, are not usually enumerated, as 
well as several enterprises in Europe itseK which partook of the 
nature of crusades. 

Viewed from the broadest standpoint the Crusades against the 
Moslems were simply an episode in that age-long drama of the 
struggle between the East and the West, between Asia and Europe, 
of which the contest between the ancient Greeks and Persians 
was the opening act. Looked at in connection with a narrower 
cycle of events, they mark the culmination of the long contest 
between the two great world religions, Islam and Christianity, 
the beginnings of which we have already seen, and which 
expresses itself to-day in the antagonism between the Ottoman 
Turks and the Christian races of Europe. 

We shall tell first of the causes which gave birth to these 
remarkable enterprises ; then narrate with some degree of par- 
ticularity the most important events which characterized the First 



122 THE CRUSADES 

Crusade, passing more lightly over the incidents of the succeed- 
ing ones, as these in all essential features were simply repetitions 
of the first movement ; and follow this with a very short account 
of the crusades within the limits of Europe. Then we shall close 
our brief survey of the crusading movements with a summary of 
their results for civilization. 

131. The Religious Motive ; Pilgrimages. — The chief moving 
force of the Holy Wars was the religious ideas and feelings of 
the times, particularly the sentiment respecting holy places and 
pilgrimages. In all ages men have been led by curiosity, senti- 
ment, or religion to make pilgrimages to spots which retain the 
memory of remarkable occurrences, or have been consecrated by 
human suffering or heroism. Especially has the religious senti- 
ment of every people made the birthplaces or the tombs of their 
prophets, saints, and martyrs places of veneration and pilgrimage. 
Benares, Mecca, and Jerusalem attest the universality and strength 
of the sentiment among Hindus, Mohammedans, and Christians 
alike. 

Among the early Christians it was thought a pious and meri- 
torious act to undertake a journey to some sacred place. Espe- 
cially was it thought that a pilgrimage to the land whose soil had 
been pressed by the feet of the Saviour of the world^ to the Holy 
City that had witnessed his martyrdom, was a peculiarly pious 
undertaking, and one which secured for the pilgrim the special 
favor and blessing of Heaven. 

Pilgrims began to make visits to the Holy Land from the 
countries of Western Europe as soon as Christianity had taken 
possession of this part of the Roman Empire. At first the jour- 
ney was so difficult and dangerous that it was undertaken by 
comparatively few. Before the conversion of the Hungarians, 
who held the land route bet^veen Germany and the Bosporus, 
the pilgrim usually made his way to some Mediterranean port, 
and sought a chance passage on board some vessel engaged in 
the Eastern trade. 

The Cluniac revival of the eleventh century (sec. 31), kmdling 
as it did a holy fervor in multitudes of souls, gave a great impulse 



THE CHURCH AND CHIVALRY 123 

to this pilgrimaging zeal, and caused the number of pilgrims to 
the Holy Land greatly to increase. Instead of solitary travelers, 
companies numbering hundreds and even thousands ^ might now 
be seen crowding the roads leading to Jerusalem; for the con- 
version of the Hungarians had recently reopened the overland 
route down the Danube. 

But just at this time a great revolution took place in the polit- 
ical affairs of the East. The Seljuk Turks, a prominent Tartar 
tribe, zealous proselytes of Islam, wrested Syria from the tolerant 
Saracen caliphs. The Christians were not long in realizing 
that power had fallen into new hands. Pilgrims were insulted 
and persecuted in every way. The churches in Jerusalem were, 
in some cases, destroyed or turned into stables. 

Now, if it were a meritorious thing to make a pilgrimage to the 
Holy Sepulcher, much more would it be a pious act to rescue 
the sacred spot from the profanation of infidels. This was the 
conviction that changed the pilgrim into a warrior, — this the 
sentiment that for two centuries and more stirred the Christian 
world to its profoundest depths and cast the population of Europe 
in wave after wave upon Asia. 

132. The Growth of a Martial Spirit in the Church ; the Church 
and Chivalry. — This transformation of pilgrimages into crusades 
would not have been possible had not the Church itself in the 
course of the centuries undergone an amazing transformation. 
In the earliest Christian times a Quaker spirit ruled the Church; 
by the eleventh century a martial spirit had taken complete pos- 
session of it. Christ had commanded his disciples to put up the 
sword ; now the head of the Church commanded all to gird on 
the sword and fight for the faith. 

Various causes and circumstances had concurred to effect in 
the Church this astonishing transformation. First, Christianity, 
while transforming the barbarians, had been itself transformed 
by them. The new converts had carried their martial spirit into 
the Church. Fighters they had been and fighters they remained. 

1 The largest company of which there is record numbered 7000 persons. This 
was led by an archbishop and set out in the year 1064. 



124 THE CRUSADES 

Transformed by this alien spirit the Church modified its early 
Quaker teachings, and came at last to approve the military life, 
which the first Christians had very generally condemned as 
incompatible with the teachings of the Master. 

A second cause of the transformation is to be sought in the 
mediaeval way of thinking about ordeals, especially the ordeal of 
battle. As we have seen, the idea underlying the wager of battle 
was that God would miraculously intervene and give victory to 
the right. How natural then the belief that in the greater matter 
of a battle between armies God might be trusted to give righteous 
judgment. This conviction was reenforced by the chronicles of 
the Old Testament. In the wars waged by the Jews at the com- 
mand of Jehovah against their heathen enemies the mediaeval 
Christians found ample warrant for their crusades against the 
pagan and infidel enemies of the Church. 

Still a third influence that helped to introduce the military' 
spirit into the Church was the reaction upon it of the martial 
creed of Islam. For three centuries and more before the First 
Crusade the Moslems had been in contact, and during much 
of this time in actual combat, with the Christians of Europe. 
Under such circumstances the Church, as was natural, caught 
the military spirit of Mohammedanism and became quite as 
ready as its rival to call upon its followers to fight in defense 
or for the spread of the faith. 

This military spirit in Christendom found characteristic expres- 
sion in chivalry. We have already spoken of the relation of the 
Church to the institution of knighthood (sec. 103). Chivalry 
passed under its tuition and patronage. When at the close of 
the eleventh century there went forth the papal call for volun- 
teers for the Holy Wars, it fell upon the willing ears of myriads 
of knights eager to make good their oaths of knighthood and to 
win renown in combat with the Moslem infidel. Once the old 
pagan Roman had made use of these same war-loving men of the 
North to fight the battles of the Empire ; now the new Christian 
Rome enlists them beneath her standard to fight the battles of 
the Cross. 



THE PEACE AND TRUCE OF GOD 125 

133. The Peace and the Truce of God. — Closely connected 
with the subject of the preceding paragraph, and also related 
in a very significant way to the Crusades, was the institution 
established by the Church in the eleventh century and known 
as the " Truce of God." 

We have already become acquainted in some measure with 
the anarchical condition of society under feudahsm. The central 
authority of the state was everywhere relaxed, and neither the 
emperors nor the kings were able to put a stop to the marauding 
and fighting of the great feudal lords. This right of waging pri- 
vate war was one of the most dearly prized privileges of these 
semicivihzed barons. They were quite as unwilling to give up 
this right as the nations of to-day are to surrender their right of 
public war. So Europe had reverted to that condition of per- 
petual warfare between tribes and clans that the continent was 
in before Rome arose, and after centuries of titanic effort estab- 
lished throughout her wide Empire what was called the " Roman 
Peace" {Pax Romano). Every land was filled with fightings 
and violence. As one writer pictures it: "Every hill was a 
stronghold, every plain a battlefield. The trader was robbed on 
the highway, the peasant was killed at his plow,, the priest was 
slain at the altar. Neighbor fought against neighbor, baron 
against baron, city against city." 

In the midst of this intolerable anarchy the Church lifted up 
a protesting voice. In the early part of the eleventh century 
there was a movement in France which aimed at the complete 
abolition of war between Christians. The Church proposed to 
do what had been effected for a time by the Caesars. It pro- 
claimed what was called the "Peace of God." In the name of 
the God of peace it commanded all men to refrain from war and 
robbery and violence of every kind as contrary to the spirit and 
the teachings of Christianity. But it was found utterly impos- 
sible to make men desist from waging private wars, even though 
they were threatened with the everlasting tortures of hell. 

Then the clergy in Southern France, seeing they could not 
suppress the evil entirely, concluded it were wiser to try to 



126 THE CRUSADES 

regulate it. This led to the promulgation of what was called the 
"Truce of God." We find the first trace of this in the year 
1041.^ The movement connects itself, as do almost all great 
moral reforms at this time, with the Cluniac revival. 

In the year named the abbot of Cluny and several bishops 
united in issuing an edict in which all men were commanded to 
maintain a holy and unbroken peace during four days of the 
week, from Thursday evening to Monday morning, that is, during 
the days which were supposed to be rendered peculiarly sacred 
by the Saviour's death, burial, and resurrection. Whosoever 
should dare disobey the decree was threatened with the severest 
penalties of the Church. 

This movement to redeem at least a part of the days from 
fighting and violence embraced in time all the countries of 
Western Europe. The details of the various edicts issued by 
Church councils and by the popes varied widely, but all embraced 
the principle of the edict of 1041. 

This Truce of God was not, as we may easily believe, very 
well observed ; yet it did at least something during the eleventh 
and twelfth centuries to better the general condition of things, 
to mitigate the evils of private warfare, and to render life more 
tolerable and property more secure. We shall see a little later 
how the Church used the restraining authority it had acquired 
in this field to make it possible and safe for the feudal barons 
and knights, leaving their fiefs and other possessions under the 
protecting aegis of the Church, to go with their retainers on the 
distant expeditions of the Crusades. 

134. Norman Restlessness and Crusading Zeal. — To the vari- 
ous causes and antecedents of the Crusades already noticed must 
be added, as a near inciting cause, that spirit of adventure and 
unrest with which almost all the lands of Western Europe were 
at just this time being filled by the enterprises of the Normans. 
The conquest of England by William the Conqueror and that of 
Southern Italy and Sicily by other Norman leaders were simply 
two of the most important of their undertakings. Throughout 
2 Kluckhohn, GesckichU 4^? QotUsfrkdens, p. 38, 



VARIOUS MINOR CAUSES 



127 



the eleventh century the Norman knights, true to the old Viking 
spirit of their ancestors, were constantly raiding in Spain, in 
Africa, and in other Moslem lands. Everywhere they engaged 
in battle with the infidels. Everywhere they stirred up the 
embers of the old fierce hate between Christian and Moslem. 
Everywhere throughout Western Christendom they awakened, 
by their restless zeal, the crusading spirit, and thus did much 
to prepare the way for the Holy Wars. 

135. Various Minor Causes. — We have now detailed the chief 
causes, remote and immediate, of the Crusades. But there were 
other concurring causes which must not be overlooked. Many 
took part in the expeditions from mere love of change, excite- 
ment, and adventure. Some of the Italian cities engaged in the 
undertakings from commercial or political motives. Many knights, 
princes, and even kings headed expeditions with a view of secur- 
ing fiefs in the East from lands wrested from the infidel. Multi- 
tudes of serfs joined them to escape from a life of misery that 
had become unbearable. And vast numbers of the baser sort 
joined them in order to secure immunity from the penalty of 
debt and crime ; for, as we shall see, the person and property of 
the crusader were taken under the special protection of the 
Church. 

Yet notwithstanding that so many unworthy motives animated 
vast numbers of those engaging in the Crusades, we shall not be 
wrong in thinking that it was the religious feeling of the times, 
the conviction that the enterprise of rescuing the sacred places 
was a holy one, which was the main motive power, in the absence 
of which all the other causes and motives enumerated would have 
proved wholly inadequate either to set in motion or to keep in 
motion these remarkable and long-continued expeditions. Because 
it was a generous religious sentiment that organized them, because 
it was the moving force of a grand religious ideal that maintained 
them so long, they are rightly called Holy Wars. 

136. Circumstances favoring the Crusading Enterprises. — Not- 
withstanding the number and strength of the forces that concurred 
to transform the population of the West into zealous crusaders, 



128 



THE CRUSADES 



the Holy Wars would not have been possible, or would have failed 
to meet with even the partial and temporary success that attended 
them, had it not been for several favoring circumstances. 

First,- just before this time the Hungarians had been converted, 
and thus the overland route to the East, which for centuries had 
been barred by heathen hordes, was reopened. Thus was the 

pathway for the 
earlier Crusades 
prepared. 

Second, the 
growth during the 
tenth and eleventh 
centuries of the 
sea power of the 
republics of Ven- 
ice, Genoa, and 
Pisa, together with 
that of the Nor- 
mans, and the con- 
quest by the latter 
of Sicily from the 
Saracens (sec. 
112), enabled the 
Christians to clear 
the Middle Medi- 
terranean of the 
Moslem pirate 
ships that had vexed its waters and shores ever since the rise of the 
Mohammedan power. Because of the crusaders' dread of the sea, 
the water route to Palestine was not followed by the earlier expedi- 
tions ; but the advantages of the water passage gradually came to 
be realized and all the later expeditions reached their destination 
by ship. From the beginning of the movements it was alone the 
command of the sea by the Italian cities that rendered possible that 
transport service which was indispensable to the maintenance of 
the colonies established in Palestine as a result of the First Crusade. 




Fig. 24. — Reception of Crusaders by the King 
OF Hungary. (From a fifteenth-century manu- 
script ; after Lacroix) 



THE LEGEND OF PETER THE HERMIT 129 

Third, just four years before the First Crusade the vast empire 
which had been estabUshed in Asia by the Seljuk Turks fell to 
pieces and was replaced by a number of mutually jealous Turkish 
principalities. This was a most fortunate circumstance for the 
first crusaders, for had they been compelled to encounter the 
undivided forces of the original empire, it is not probable that any 
of them would ever have reached the Holy Land. 

Fourth, the cause of the Christians was greatly furthered by 
the antagonism of the Arabs and the Turks. This antagonism — 
which has been prolonged to our own day — almost fatally divided 
the strength of the Mohammedan world. 

Finally, the development within the Church of the papal power 
was a circumstance in the absence of which the Crusades could 
never have found a place in the history of Western Christendom. 
The popes used their preeminent authority to persuade the 
people to engage in the wars as pious undertakings. It was they 
who incited, organized, and directed with greater or less success 
the expeditions, and to them belongs whatever measure of praise 
or of censure attaches to the enterprises as a whole. 

137. The Legend of Peter the Hermit. —There is a tradition 
which makes one immediate inciting cause of the First Crusade 
to have been the preaching of a monk named Peter the Hermit, 
a native of France. This legend tells how the monk, moved by 
devout longing, made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land ; how his 
sympathy and indignation were stirred by the sight of the indig- 
nities and cruelties to which the native and the pilgrim Christians 
were subjected by the infidels ; and how, armed with letters from 
the patriarch of Jerusalem to the Christians of Europe, he hastened 
to Rome, and there, at the feet of Pope Urban II, begged to be 
commissioned to preach a crusade for the deliverance of the Holy 
City. The Pope is represented as commending warmly the zeal 
of the hermit, and, with promises of aid, sending him forth to stir 
up the people to engage in the holy undertaking. 

The legend now exhibits the monk as going everywhere, and 
addressing in the streets and in the open fields the crowds that 
press about him. The people look upon the monk, clothed in 



I30 THE CRUSADES 

the coarse raiment of an anchorite, as a messenger from Heaven, 
and even venerate the ass upon which he rides. His wild and 
fervid eloquence alternately melts his auditors to tears, or lifts 
them into transports of enthusiasm. 

Such, in essential features, is the tradition of Peter the Hermit. 
The first part of this account is now discredited, and it seems 
quite certain that the monk's alleged pilgrimage to Jerusalem is a 
pure embelHshment of the tale by later romancers. That the 
preaching of the monk, however, was of a most extraordinary 
character and produced a deep impression upon the popular mind 
is beyond doubt. But the real originator of the First Crusade was 
Pope Urban, and not the hermit, as the legend represents. 

138. The Council of Clermont (1095). — While the religious 
feelings of the Christians of the West were growing tenser day by 
day, the Turks in the East were making constant advances, until 
at last they were threatening Constantinople itself. The Emperor 
Alexis Comnenus sent urgent letters to the Pope, asking for aid 
against the infidels, representing that, unless help were extended 
immediately, the capital with all its holy relics must soon fall into 
the hands of the barbarians. 

Pope Urban called a great council of the Church at Piacenza 
in Italy to consider the appeal, but nothing was effected at this 
meeting. Later in the same year a new council was convened 
at Clermont in France, Urban purposely fixing the place of meet- 
ing among the warm- tempered and martial Franks. Fourteen 
archbishops, two hundred and twenty-five bishops, four hundred 
abbots, and of others a multitude that no man could number, 
crowded to the council. 

After the meeting had considered some minor matters the 
question which was agitating all hearts was brought before it. 
The Pope himself was one of the chief speakers. He possessed 
the gift of eloquence, so that the man, the cause, and the occasion 
all contributed to the achievement of one of the greatest triumphs 
of human oratory. Urban pictured the humiliation and misery of 
the provinces of Asia; the profanation of the places made sacred 
by the presence and footsteps of the Son of God j and then he 



MUSTERING OF THE CRUSADERS 131 

detailed the conquests of the Turks, until now, with almost all 
"Asia Minor in their possession, they were threatening Europe 
from the shores of the Hellespont. ''When Jesus Christ sum- 
mons you to his defense," exclaimed the eloquent pontiff, " let 
no base affection detain you in your homes ; whoever will aban- 
don his house, or his father, or his mother, or his wife, or his 
children, or his inheritance, for the sake of his name, shall be 
recompensed a hundredfold and possess life eternal." 

Here the enthusiasm of the vast assembly burst through every 
restraint. With one voice they cried, ^^ Dieu le volt ! Dieit le 
volt! " " It is the will of God ! It is the will of God ! " , Thou- 
sands immediately affixed the cross ^ to their garments as a pledge 
of their engagement to go forth to the rescue of the Holy Sepul- 
cher. The following summer was set for the expedition. 

XL The First Crusade (i 096-1 099) 

139. Mustering of the Crusaders. — It was the countries of 
France and Southern Italy that were most deeply stirred by the 
papal call. In these lands the contagion of the enthusiasm seized 
upon almost all classes alike ; for it was the common religious 
feeling of the age to which the appeal had been especially made. 
The Council of Clermont had proclaimed anew the Truce of God, 
with a very great extension of its prohibitions, and had pronounced 
anathemas against any one who should invade the possessions of a 
prince engaged in the Holy War. By edict the Pope had granted 
to all who should enlist from right motives "remission of all 
canonical penalties," and promised to the truly penitent, in case 
they should die on the expedition, " the joy of life eternal." 

Under such inducements princes and nobles, bishops and 
priests, monks and anchorites, saints and sinners, rich and poor, 
hastened to enroll themselves beneath the standard of the Cross. 
" Europe," says Michaud, " appeared to be a land of exile, which 
every one was eager to quit." 

8 Hence the name " Crusades " given to the Holy Wars, from Old French crois, 



132 THE CRUSADES 

140. The Vanguard. — Before the regular armies of the cru- 
saders were ready to move, those who had gathered about Peter 
the Hermit, becoming impatient of delay, urged him to place 
himself at their head and lead them at once to the Holy Land. 
Dividing command of the mixed multitudes with a poor knight 
called Walter the Penniless, and followed by a throng, it is said, 
of eighty thousand persons,* among whom were many women and 
children, the hermit set out for Constantinople by the overland 
route through Germany and Hungary. Thousands of the crusaders 
perished miserably of hunger and exposure on the march. Those 
who crossed the Bosporus were surprised by the Turks, and almost 
all were slaughtered. Thus perished the forlorn hope of the First 
Crusade. 

141. March of the Main Body; the Capture of Jerusalem (1099). 
— Meanwhile a real army was gathering in the West. Raymond, 
Count of Toulouse ; Robert, Duke of Normandy ; Godfrey of 
Bouillon, Duke of Lower Lorraine ; Bohemund, Prince of OtrantOj 
and his nephew, Tancred, the "mirror of knighthood," were 
among the most noted of the leaders of the different divisions 
of the army. The expedition is said to have numbered about 
three hundred thousand men. 

The crusaders traversed Europe by different routes and re- 
assembled at Constantinople. Crossing the Bosporus, they first 
captured Nicaea, the Turkish capital in Bithynia, and then set out 
across Asia Minor for Syria. The line of their dreary march 
between Nicaea and Antioch was whitened with the bones of 
nearly one half their number. Arriving at Antioch, the survivors 
captured that place, and then, after considerable delay, pushed 
on towards Jerusalem. 

When at length the Holy City burst upon their view, a perfect 
delirium of joy seized the crusaders. They embraced one another 
with tears of joy, and even embraced and kissed the ground on 
which they stood. As they moved on, they took off their shoes, 

4 As Kugler observes, the enormous figures of the chroniclers can only be taken 
to mean " a great many people." They represent, of course, simply vague guesses 
or estimates. 




EUROPE ANI> THE 

IN 1096 1^ 

On tlie eve of the Crusades J 

dl] Christian Landsilatin ChurA") I I Mohammedan Lands 

I I rhrJHtlftn Lands (.Greek Church) L—H Regions Still Pagan 
100 200 300 400 500 



Scale of Miles 



TME"»I.-N. WORKS, BUFFALO, 



THE LATIN KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM 133 

and marched with uncovered head and bare feet, singing the words 
of the prophet : " Jerusalem, lift up thine eyes, and behold the 
liberator who comes to break thy chains." 

The city was taken by storm. A terrible slaughter of the infidels 
followed. "And if you desire to know what was done with the 
enemy who were found there," thus runs a home letter of one of 
the crusaders, " know that in Solomon's Porch and in his temple 
our men rode in the blood of the Saracens up to the knees of 
their horses." 

142. Founding of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. — The gov- 
ernment which the crusaders established for the city and country 
they had conquered was a model feudal state, called the Latin 
Kingdom of Jerusalem. The code known as the Assizes of Jeru- 
salem, which was a late compilation of the rules and customs 
presumably followed by the judges of the little state, forms one of 
the most interesting collections of feudal customs in existence. 

At the head of the kingdom was placed Godfrey of Bouillon, 
the most devoted of the crusader knights. The prince refused 
the title and vestments of royalty, declaring that he would never 
wear a crown of gold in the city where his Lord and Master had 
worn a crown of thorns. The only title he would accept was that 
of " Baron of the Holy Sepulcher." 

Many of the crusaders, considering their vows to deliver the 
Holy City as now fulfilled, soon set out on their return to their 
homes, some making their way back by sea and some by land. 



III. The Second Crusade (1147-1149) 

143. Origin of the Religious Orders of Knighthood. — In the 
interval between the First and the Second Crusade, the two famed 
rehgious military orders known as the Hospitalers and the Tem- 
plars ^ were formed. A Httle later, during the Third Crusade, still 

5 The Hospitalers, or Knights of St. John, took their name from the fact that 
the organization was first formed among the monks of the Hospital of St. John 
at Jerusalem; while the Templars, or Knights of the Temple, were so called on 
account of one of the buildings of the brotherhood occupying the site of Solomon's 



134 THE CRUSADES 

another fraternity known as the Teutonic Knights was established. 
The objects of all the orders were the care of the sick and 
wounded crusaders, the entertainment of Christian pilgrims, the 
guarding of the holy places, and ceaseless battling for the Cross. 
These fraternities soon acquired a military fame that was spread 
throughout the Christian world. They were joined by many of the 
most illustrious knights of the West, and through the gifts of the 
pious acquired great wealth, and became possessed of numerous 
estates and castles in Europe as well as in Asia. 

144. The Fall of Edessa (11 44); Preaching of St. Bernard; 
Failure of the Crusade. — In the year 1146, the city of Edessa, 
the outlying bulwark on the side towards Mesopotamia of the 
Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, was taken by the Turks and the 
entire population slaughtered or sold into slavery. This disaster 
threw Europe into a state of the greatest alarm lest the little 
Christian state should be overwhelmed and all the holy places 
should again fall into the hands of the infidels. 

The scenes that marked the opening of the First Crusade were 
now repeated, in many of the countries of the West. St. Bernard 
of Clairvaux, an eloquent monk, was the second Peter the Hermit 
who went everywhere arousing the warriors of .the Cross to the 
defense of the birthplace of their religion. The contagion of the 
enthusiasm seized upon not merely barons, knights, and the com- 
mon people, which classes alone participated in the First Crusade, 
but the greatest sovereigns were now infected by it. Louis VII, 
king of France, was led to undertake the crusade through remorse 
for an act of great cruelty of which he had been guilty against 
some of his revolted subjects.® The Emperor Conrad III of Ger- 
many was persuaded to leave the affairs of his distracted realms 
in the hands of God and consecrate himself to the defense of the 
sepulcher of Christ. 

Temple. In the case of the Hospitalers it was monks who added to their ordinary 
monastic vows those of knighthood; in the case of the Templars it was knights who 
added to their military vows those of religion. Thus were united the seemingly 
incongruous ideals of the monk and the knight. 

6 The act which troubled the king's conscience was the burning of 1300 people in 
a church, whither they had fled for refuge. 



THE THIRD CRUSADE 135 

The best part of the strength of both the German and the 
French division of the expedition was wasted in Asia Minor. 
Mere remnants of the armies joined in Palestine. The siege of 
Damascus, which was now undertaken, proved unsuccessful, and 
the crusaders returned home, " having accomplished all that God 
willed and the people of the country permitted." 



IV. The Third Crusade (1189-1192) 

145. Capture of Jerusalem by Saladin ; Leaders of the Crusade. 

— The Third Crusade was caused by the capture of Jerusalem 
by Saladin, the renowned sultan of Egypt. This event occurred 
in the year 11 87. The intelligence of the disaster caused the 
greatest consternation and grief throughout Christendom. Three 
of the great sovereigns of Europe, Frederick Barbarossa of Ger- 
many, Philip Augustus of France, and Richard I of England, 
assumed the cross, and set out, each at the head of a large army, 
for the recovery of the Holy City. 

The English king, Richard, afterwards given the title of 
Cceur de Lion, the " Lion-hearted," in memory of his heroic 
exploits in Palestine, was the central figure among the Christian 
knights of this crusade. 

146. Death of Frederick Barbarossa ; the Siege of Acre. — 
The German army, attempting the overland route, after meeting 
with the usual troubles in Eastern Europe from the unfriendliness 
of the natives, was decimated in Asia Minor by the hardships of 
the march and the swords of the Turks. The Emperor Frederick 
was drowned while crossing a swollen stream, and most of the 
survivors of his army, disheartened by the loss of their leader, 
soon returned to Germany. 

The English and French kings — the first sovereigns of these 
two countries who had ever joined their arms in a common cause 

— took the sea route, and finally mustered their forces beneath 
the walls of Acre, which city the Christians were then besieging. 
After one of the longest and most costly sieges they ever carried 



136 THE CRUSADES 

on in Asia, the crusaders at last forced the place to capitulate, in 
spite of all the efforts of Saladin to render the garrison relief. 

147. Richard's Captivity and Ransom. — For two years Richard 
contended in vain with Saladin, a knightly and generous antag- 
onist according to the chroniclers, for possession of the tomb 
of Christ. He then concluded with him a truce of three years 
and eight months, which provided that the Christians during that 
period should have free access to the holy places and remain in 
undisturbed possession of the coast from Acre to Ascalon. 

Richard now set out for home. But while traversing Germany 
in disguise he was discovered and was arrested and imprisoned 
by order of the Emperor Henry VI, who was his political enemy. 
Henry cast his prisoner into a dungeon, and, notwithstanding the 
outcry of all Europe that the champion of Christianity should 
suffer such treatment at the hands of a brother prince, refused to 
release him without an enormous ransom. 

The English people, so great was their admiration for the hero 
whose prowess had reflected such luster upon English knighthood, 
set themselves to raise the sum demanded, even stripping the 
churches of their plate to make up the amount; and the lion- 
hearted crusader was at last set free, and finally reached England, 
where he was received with wild acclamation. 



V. The Fourth Crusade (i 202-1 204) 

148. Capture of Constantinople by the Latins (1204). — The 
city of Venice was the rendezvous of this expedition. It was 
made up largely of unscrupulous adventurers and the marine forces 
of Venice. It was originally aimed at Egypt but struck Constan- 
tinople. A great share of the responsibiHty for the diversion of 
the crusade from its first designation Hes, it seems, at the door 
of the Venetians, who, when it was proposed that the crusaders 
should undertake to right certain alleged wrongs of the imperial 
family at the Byzantine capital, seeing in the proposed adventure 
an opportunity to further their trade interests in the Black Sea 



THE FOURTH CRUSADE 



137 



regions, took pains to insure that the expedition should be 
launched in that direction. 

The outcome of the crusade was the capture and sack of Con- 
stantinople and the setting up of a Latin prince, Baldwin of 
Flanders, as Emperor of the East (1204). The Empire was now 
remodeled into a feudal state like the Kingdom of Jerusalem 
established by the knights of the First Crusade (sec. 142). 
Most of the Greek islands and certain of the shore lands of the 













Fig. 25. — The Horses of St. Mark's. (From a photograph) 

These celebrated bronze horses were among the trophies which the Venetians 
received as their share of the plunder when Constantinople was sacked by 
the crusaders. They were placed over the portico of St. Mark's in Venice. 
They were carried off to Paris by Napoleon during his ascendancy, but upon 
his downfall were restored to the Venetians 

old Empire were given to Venice as her share of the spoils. A 
great part of the remaining lands was allotted as fiefs to Frankish 
knights. One of the most interesting of the feudal principalities 
that arose on the ground conquered from the Greeks was the 
dukedom of Athens. Hundreds of Western knights assembled at 
this capital of ancient culture and created there a brilliant feudal 
court which completely captivated the imagination of Europe.' 

'' Recall the " Duke Theseus " in Chaucer's Knight's Tale of Palamon and 
Arcite and in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Nighfs Dream. 



138 THE CRUSADES 

The Latin Empire of Constantinople, as it was called, lasted 
only a little over half a century (i 204-1 261). The Greeks, at 
the end of this period, succeeded in regaining the throne, which 
they then held until the capture of Constantinople by the Turks 

in 1453- 

149. Lamentable Results of the Sack of Constantinople. — A 

most regrettable result of the sack of Constantinople by the 
crusaders was the destruction of the numerous masterpieces of 
art with which the city was crowcied ; for Constantinople had 
been for nine centuries the chief place of safe deposit for the 
priceless art treasures of the ancient world. The extent of the 
loss suffered by art in the ruthless sack of the city will never be 
known. It would seem as though almost all the bronze and silver 
statues and all the ornamental metal work of the churches and 
other edifices of the city went into the melting pot. 

Still another lamentable consequence of the crusaders' act 
was the weakening of the military strength of the capital. For 
a thousand years Constantinople had been the great bulwark of 
Western civilization against Asiatic barbarism. Its power of resist- 
ance was now broken, with momentous consequences for Western 
Christendom, as we shall learn later (Chapter XIV). 

VI. The Children's Crusades; Minor Crusades 

150. The Children's Crusade (12 12). — During the interval 
between the Fourth and the Fifth Crusade the religious enthu- 
siasm that had so long agitated the men of Europe came to fill 
with unrest the children, resulting in what is known as the 
Children's Crusade. 

The chief preacher of this crusade was a child about tvv^elve 
years of age, a French peasant lad, named Stephen, who became 
persuaded that Jesus Christ had commanded him to lead a cru- 
sade of children to the rescue of the Holy Sepulcher. The 
children became wild with excitement and flocked in vast crowds 
to the places appointed for rendezvous. Nothing could restrain 
them or thwart their purpose. " Even bolts and bars," says an 



THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE 139 

old chronicler, " could not hold them." The great majority of 
those who collected at the rallying places were boys under twelve 
years of age, but there were also many girls. 

The movement excited the most diverse views. Some declared 
that it was inspired by the Holy Spirit, and quoted such scriptural 
texts as these to justify the enthusiasm : " A child shall lead* 
them " ; " Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast 
ordained praise." Others, however, were quite as confident that 
the whole thing was the work'of the devil. 

The German children, whose number is variously estimated 
at from twenty to forty thousand, crossed the Alps and marched 
down the Italian shores looking for a miraculous pathway through 
the sea to Palestine. Beneath the toil and hardships of the jour- 
ney a great part of the little crusaders died or fell out by the 
way. Those reaching Rome were kindly received by the Pope, 
who persuaded them to give up their enterprise and return to 
their homes, impressing upon their minds, however, that they 
could not be released from the vows they had made, which they 
must fulfill when they became men. 

The French children, numbering thirty thousand, according to 
the chroniclers, set out from the place of rendezvous for Mar- 
seilles. Their leader, Stephen, rode in great state in a chariot 
surrounded by an escort of infantile nobles, who paid him the 
obedience and homage due a superior and sacred being. The 
little pilgrims had no conception of the distance to the Holy 
Land, and whenever a city came in sight eagerly asked if it were 
not Jerusalem. 

Arriving at Marseilles, the children were bitterly disappointed 
that the sea did not open and give them passage to Palestine. 
The greater part, discouraged and disillusioned, now returned 
home ; five or six thousand, however, accepting gladly the seem- 
ingly generous offer of two merchants of the city, who proposed 
to take them to the Holy Land free of charge, crowded into 
seven small ships and sailed out of the port of Marseilles. But 
they were betrayed and sold as slaves in Alexandria and other 
Mohammedan slave markets. A part of them, however, escaped 



I40 THE CRUSADES 

this fate, having perished in the shipwreck of two of the vessels 
that bore them from Marseilles.® 

This children's expedition marked at once the culmination 
and the decline of the crusading movement. The fervid zeal 
that inspired the first crusaders was already dying out. " These 
children," said the Pope, referring to the young crusaders, 
" reproach us with having fallen asleep, whilst they were flying to 
the assistance of the Holy Land." 

151. The Minor Crusades; End of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. 
— The last four expeditions — the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and 
Eighth ^ — undertaken by the Christians of Europe against the 
infidels of the East may be conveniently grouped as the Minor 
Crusades. They were marked by a less genuine enthusiasm than 
that which characterized particularly the First Crusade, and 
exhibited among those taking part in them the greatest variety 
of objects and ambitions. The flame of the Crusades had burned 
itself out, and the fate of the little Christian kingdom in Asia, 
isolated from Europe and surrounded on all sides by bitter ene- 
mies, became each day more and more apparent. Finally, the 
last of the places (Acre) held by the Christians fell into the 
hands of the Moslems, and with this event the Latin Kingdom 
of Jerusalem came to an end (1291). The second great com- 
bat between Mohammedanism and Christianity was over, and 
" silence reigned along the shore that had so long resounded 
with the world's debate " (Gibbon). 

8 The credibility of that part of the account which deals vdth the fate of the 
French children has been questioned, but there is really no ground for rejecting it. 
See Kugler, Geschichie der Kreuzziige, p. 307 and note. 

9 The Fifth Crusade (1216-1220) was led by the kings of Hungary and Cj'prus. 
Its strength was wasted in Egypt, and it resulted in nothing. The Sixth Crusade 
(1227-1229), headed by Frederick II of Germany, succeeded in securing from the 
Saracens the restoration of Jerusalem and that of several other cities of Palestine. 
The Seventh Crusade (1249-1254) was under the lead of Louis IX of France, sur- 
named the Saint. It met with disaster in Egj^pt. The Eighth Crusade (1270-1272) 
had for leaders St. Louis and Prince Edward of England, afterwards Edward I. 
Louis directed his forces against the Moors about Tunis, in North Africa. Here the 
king died of the plague. Nothing was effected by this division of the expedition. 
The division led by the English prince was, however, more fortunate. Edward suc- 
ceeded in capturing Nazareth and in compelHng the sultan of Egypt to agree to 
a treaty favorable to the Christians (1272). 



CRUSADES IN EUROPE I4I 

VII. Crusades in Europe 

152. General Statement. — Notwithstanding the strenuous and 
united efforts which the Christians of Europe put forth against 
the Mohammedans, they did not succeed in extending perma- 
nently the frontiers of Western civiHzation in the Orient. 

But in the southwest and the northeast of Europe it was dif- 
ferent. Here the crusading spirit rescued from Moslem and 
pagan large territories, and upon these regained or newly acquired 
lands established a number of little Christian principalities, which 
later grew into states, or came to form a portion of states, which 
were to play great parts in the history of the following centuries. 
The states whose beginnings are thus connected with the cru- 
sading age are Portugal, Spain, and Prussia. We will say just a 
single word respecting each of them. 

153. Crusades against the Moors in the Iberian Peninsula. — ■ 
Just before the actual beginning of the Crusades against the 
Moslems of the East a band of northern knights went to the help 
of the Christians against the Moslems in the west of the Iberian 
peninsula. The issue of this chivalric enterprise was the forma- 
tion of a little feudal principality, the nucleus of the later king- 
dom of Portugal. At the time of the Second Crusade some 
German and English crusaders, on their way to Palestine by sea, 
stopped here and aided the native Christians in the siege and 
capture from the Mohammedans of the important city of Lisbon 
(1147). This gave the little growing state its future capital. 
Thus Portugal was, in a very strict sense, a creation of the 
crusading spirit. 

Then during all the time that the Crusades proper were going 
on in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Spanish Christian knights 
were engaged in almost one uninterrupted crusade against the 
Moslem intruders. By the middle of the thirteenth century the 
Christians had crowded the Moors into a small region in 
the southern part of the peninsula. Upon the ground thus 
regained there arose a number of small Christian states which 
finally coalesced to form the modern kingdom of Spain. The 



142 THE CRUSADES 

circumstances of the origin of this kingdom left a deep impress 
upon all its subsequent history (sec. 248). 

154. Crusades by the Teutonic Knights against the Pagan Slavs 
(122 6-1 283). — At the time of the Crusades all the Baltic shore 
lands lying eastward of the Vistula and which to-day form a part 
of Prussia were held by pagan Slavs. These people, like the pagan 
Saxons of an earlier time, resisted strenuously the introduction of 
Christianity among them. Devoted priests who carried the gos- 
pel to them, together with the converts they made, were often 
massacred. Finally, a crusade was preached against them. 

Early in the thirteenth century (1226) some knights of the 
Teutonic order transferred their crusading efforts to these northern 
heathen lands. For the greater part of the century the knights 
carried on what was a desperate and almost continuous war of 
extermination against the pagans. Upon the land wrested from 
them were founded the important fortress-cities of Konigsberg 
and Marienburg. The surrounding Slav population was either 
destroyed or subjected, and the whole land was gradually Ger- 
manized. Thus what was originally Slav territory was converted 
into a German land, and the basis laid of a principality which 
later came to form an important part of modern Prussia.^" Thus 
the crusading zeal of the knight monks contributed to the creation 
of one of the strongest of modern European states. 

155. Crusades against the Albigenses (1209-12 29). — During 
the crusading age holy wars were preached and waged against 
heretics as well as against infidels and pagans. 

In the south of France was a sect of Christians called Albi- 
genses,^^ who had departed so far from the orthodox faith that 
Pope Innocent III declared them to be " more wicked than Sara- 
cens." He therefore, after a vain endeavor to turn them from 
their errors, called upon the French king, Philip II, and his 
nobles to lead a crusade against the heretics and their rich and 
powerful patron, Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse. 

10 See on map of modem Europe how the German territory on the northeast is 
thrust out into the Slavonic mass. 

11 From Albi, the name of a city and district in which their tenets prevailed. 



EFFECT UPON THE EASTERN EMPIRE 143 

The king held aloof from the enterprise, being fully occupied 
watching his own enemies; but a great number of his nobles 
responded eagerly to the call of the Church. The leader of the 
First Crusade (1209-12 13) was Simon de Montfort, a man cruel, 
callous, and relentless beyond belief. A great part of Languedoc, 
the beautiful country of the Albigenses, was made a desert, the 
inhabitants being slaughtered and the cities burned. 

In 1229 the fury of a fresh crusade burst upon the Albigenses, 
which resulted in their prince (Raymond VII) ceding the greater 
part of his beautiful but ravaged provinces to Louis IX, king of 
France, and submitting himself to the Church. The Albigensian 
heresy was soon wholly extirpated by the tribunal of the Inquisition 
which was set up in the country. 

VIII. Influence upon European Civilization of 
THE Crusades 

156. Their Effect upon the Eastern Empire. — Among the most 
noteworthy results of the Crusades we may place the preservation 
for a time of Constantinople.-^^ The shock of the First Crusade 
rolled back the tide of Turkish conquest, and thus postponed the 
fall of the Eastern Empire, or at least of its capital, for three cen- 
turies and more, thereby gaining for the young Christian civiliza- 
tion of Central Europe time sufficient to consolidate its strength 
into an impregnable bulwark before the returning tide of Moham- 
medan invasion swept in again upon Christendom. It is altogether 
probable that, had the Seljuk Turks been allowed to cross the 
Bosporus in the twelfth century, they would have carried their 
conquests much farther towards the West than their kinsmen, the 
Osmanli, were able to do in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries 
(Chapter XIV). 

Furthermore, the fall of Constantinople in the twelfth century 
would have meant probably the permanent loss of all the literary 

12 But for the crime of the men of the Fourth Crusade (sec, 148) the Eastern 
emperors might possibly have been able to hold the Bosporus indefinitely against the 
Ottoman Turks. 



144 



THE CRUSADES 



treasures the city was holding in safe-keeping for civilization ; foi 
the West was not yet ready, as is shown by the vandalism of 
the men of the Fourth Crusade, to become the appreciative and 
reverent guardian of this precious bequest. 

157. Their Effects upon the Towns and upon Commerce and 
Society. — The towns gained many political advantages at the 
expense of the crusading barons and princes. Ready money in 
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries was largely in the hands of 
the burgher class, and in return for the contributions and loans 
they made to their overlords or suzerains they received charters 

conferring special and valuable privi- 
leges. Thus, while power and wealth 
were slipping out of the hands of the 
nobility, the cities and towns were 
growing in political importance and 
making great gains in the matter of 
municipal freedom. 

The Holy Wars further promoted the 
prosperity of the towns by giving a great 
impulse to commercial enterprise. Dur- 
ing this period Venice, Pisa, and Genoa 
acquired great wealth and reputation 
through the fostering of their trade by 
the needs of the crusaders and the 
opening up of the East. The Mediter- 
ranean was whitened with the sails of 
their transport ships, which were constantly plying between the 
various ports of Europe and the towns of the Syrian coast. Also, 
various arts, manufactures, and inventions (among these the wind- 
mill ^^ and probably the mariner's compass) before unknown in 
Europe were introduced from Asia. This enrichment of the civili- 
zation of the West with the "spoils of the East" we may allow 
to be emblemized by the famous bronze horses that the crusaders 




Fig. 26. — A Medieval 
Windmill. (From an 
engraving of an abbey and 
its precincts, dating from 
about the middle of the 
fourteenth century) 



13 Windmills were chiefly utilized in the Netherlands, where they were used J:o 
pump the water from the oversoaked lands, and thus became the means of creating 
the most important part of what is now the kingdom of Holland. 



THEIR POLITICAL EFFECTS 145 

carried off from Constantinople and set up before St. Mark's 
Cathedral in Venice (Fig. 25). 

The effects of the Crusades upon the social life of the Western 
nations were marked and important. Giving opportunity for 
romantic adventure, they aided powerfully in the development of 
that institution of knighthood which, as we have seen, nourished 
many of the noblest virtues and most exalted sentiments of 
modern society (sec. 109). And under this head must be placed 
the general refining influence that contact with the more cultured 
nations of the East had upon the semibarbarous folk of the West. 
These influences, which we designate the social, were felt of 
course in the country as well as in the town, but their more per- 
manent impress was probably left upon the life of the urban 
communities. 

158. Their Political Effects. — The Crusades, as we have 
noticed in another connection (sec. 99), helped to break down 
the power of the feudal aristocracy and give prominence to" the 
kings and the people. Many of the nobles who set out on the 
expeditions never returned, and their estates, through failure of 
heirs, escheated to the crown; while many more wasted their 
fortunes in meeting the expenses of their undertaking. Thus the 
nobility were greatly weakened in numbers and influence, and 
the power and patronage of the kings correspondingly increased. 
This process of the disintegration of feudalism and the growth of 
monarchy is to be traced most distinctly in France, the cradle 
and center of the crusading movement. 

The laying of the foundations of the later states of Portugal, 
Spain, and Prussia should also be noticed here as showing how 
the Crusades helped to create the map of modern Europe. 

159. Their Effects upon the Native Literatures and the Intellec- 
tual Life of Europe. — In no realm were the effects of the Crusades 
more positive than in the field of Hterature. From the East was 
brought in a vast amount of fresh literary material consisting of 
the traditions of great events like the siege of Troy, and of great 
heroes, such as Solomon and Alexander the Great. These legends, 
exaggerated and distorted and curiously mingled with the folk- 



146 THE CRUSADES 

lore of the Western peoples, came now to form the basis of a vast 
literature consisting of romances, epic poems, and pious tales, 
infinite in variety and form. In this way the native literatures of 
Europe were enriched and their growth greatly stimulated. 

Furthermore, the knowledge of geography and of the science 
and learning of the East gained by the crusaders through their 
expeditions greatly stimulated the Latin intellect and helped to 
awaken in Western Europe that mental activity which resulted 
finally in the great intellectual outburst known as the Renaissance 
(Chapter XVIII). 

160. Their Influence on Geographical Discovery. — Lastly, the 
incentive given to geographical exploration led various travelers, 
such as the celebrated Venetian Marco Polo, to range over the 
most remote countries of Asia. Nor did the matter end here. 
Even that spirit of maritime enterprise and adventure which 
rendered illustrious the close of the Middle Ages, inspiring the 
voyages of Columbus, Vasco da Gama, and Magellan, may be 
traced back to that lively interest in geographical matters, that 
curiosity respecting the remote regions of the earth, awakened by 
the expeditions of the crusaders.-^* 

These various growths and movements, commercial, social, polit- 
ical, intellectual, and geographical, in European society, which, 
though not originated by the Crusades, were nevertheless given a 
fresh impulse by them, we shall trace out in following chapters. 



Selections from the Sources. — Chronicles of the Crusades (Bohn). 
Read the chronicle by Geoffrey, who writes as an eye-witness of scenes 
of the Third Crusade. Archer, Crusade of Richard I. (English History 
by Contemporary Writers). Translations and Reprints, vol. i, No. 4, 
"Letters of the Crusaders"; also vol. iii, No. i, "The Fourth Crusade" 
(both ed. by Dana Carleton Munro). Henderson, Select Historical 
Documents, p. 208, " Decree of the Emperor Henry IV concerning a Truce 

14 Colonel Henry Yule, speaking of the influence of the travels and writings of 
Marco Polo, says : " The spur which his book eventually gave to geographical studies, 
and the beacon which it hung out at the eastern extremities of the earth, helped to 
guide the aims ... of the greater son of the rival republic. His work was at least a 
link in the providential chain which at last dragged the New World to Hght" — 
Introduction to The Book of Ser Marco Polo (London, 1875). 



BIBLIOGRAPHY I47 

of God (1085).'* Robinson, Readings in Europea7i History, vol. i, chap. xv. 
MuNRO and Sellery, Mediceval Civilization, pp. 257-268. 

Secondary Works. — Sybel, The History and Literature of the Cru- 
sades. For the mature reader. Burr, The Year 1000 and the Antece- 
dents of the Crusades (in Am. Hist. Rev. for April, 1901, vol. vi. No. 3). 
Shows the unhistorical character of the tradition of the " millennial terror." 
Archer and Kingsford, The Crusades. Cox, The Crusades. Bemont 
and Monod, Mediceval Europe, chap. xxii. Emerton, Mediceval Europe, 
chap. xi. Adams, Civilization during the Middle Ages, c)i2cp.yii. MiCHAUD, 
History of the Crusades. Very interesting, but in part discredited through 
a new appraisement of the trustworthiness of the sources for the Crusades. 
Pears, The Fall of Constantinople. The best account of the Fourth Cru- 
sade. Gray, The Children's Crusade. Oman, Byzatttine Empire, chaps, 
xxi and xxii. Lecky, History of European Morals, vol. ii, pp. 248-254; 
for the development of the military spirit in the Church. Gibbon, The 
Decline and Fall, chaps. Iviii— Ixi. CuTTS, Scenes and Characters of the 
Middle Ages, pp. 157-194, "The Pilgrims of the Middle Ages." Lane- 
Poole, Saladin, and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. MuNRO and 
Sellery, Mediceval Civilization, pp. 248-256 and 269-276. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Palmer. 2. The Truce of God. 
3. Letters of the crusaders. 4. St. Bernard and the Second Crusade. 
5. Incidents of the Fourth Crusade. 6. The Children's Crusade. 7. St 
Louis, king of France, as a crusader. 



CHAPTER XIII 

SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY; DECLINE OF ITS TEMPORAL 

POWER 

i6i. Preliminary Survey: the Papacy at its Height. — In an 

earlier chapter on the Empire and the Papacy we related the begin- 
nings of the contention for supremacy between Pope and Emperor. 
In the present chapter we shall first speak of the Papacy at the 
height of its power, and then tell how, as the popes, with the Em- 
pire ruined, seemed about to realize their ideal of a universal eccle- 
siastical and secular monarchy, its temporal power was shattered 
by a new opposing force, — the rising nations. 

The temporary success of the papal party, and the virtual 
establishment for a time of a theocracy over Western Christen- 
dom, was due more than to aught else to the fortunate succession 
in the papal chair of great men all animated by the steady pur- 
pose of making supreme the authority of the Roman see. We 
have already noticed the work of some of these makers of the 
Papacy, notably that of Pope Gregory VII. Gregory had many 
worthy successors. The most eminent of these were Alexander 
III (1159-1181) and Innocent III (1198-1216), under whom 
the power of the Papacy was at its height. 

In the paragraphs immediately following we shall glance at some 
of the events which signaUzed the pontificates of these represen- 
tatives of the papal supremacy. The events we shall touch upon 
are those which record the triumph of the Papacy first over the 
Empire and then over the kings of France and England. 

162. Pope Alexander III and Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. — 
A little after the settlement known as the Concordat of Worms 
(sec. 129) the first of the House of Hohenstaufen came to the 
German throne, and then began a sharp contention, lasting, with 

148 



THE PEACE OF VENICE 149 

intervals of strained peace, for more than a century, between 
the emperors of this proud family and the successive occupants 
of the papal chair. This contest was practically the continuation, 
although under changed conditions of course, of the struggle 
begun long before to decide which should be supreme, the 
*' world priest" or the "world king." 

The contention filled Germany and Italy, all the lands over 
which the emperors claimed supremacy, with turmoil and vio- 
lence. The story of the struggle, given with any detail, would 
fill many volumes. In the present connection we can do lio 
more than simply note the issue of the quarrel in so far as it 
concerned Pope Alexander III and one of the most noted of 
the Hohenstaufen, Frederick Barbarossa. 

In his struggle with the Emperor, the Pope had as allies the 
Eastern Emperor, the king of Sicily, and, above all others in 
importance to him, the Lombard cities, who were rebelHous 
towards Frederick because of his assertion and harsh exercise 
of imperial rights over them. After maintaining the contest for 
many years Frederick, vanquished and humiliated, was constrained 
to seek reconciliation with the Pope. Then followed the Peace 
of Venice (117 7) with its dramatic incidents. In front of St. 
Mark's Cathedral, in the presence of a vast throng, Frederick, 
overwhelmed by a sudden emotion of awe and reverence, cast 
off his mantle and flung himself at the feet of the venerable 
pontiff, who raised him from the ground and gave him the kiss 
of peace. That was for the imperial power its second Canossa. 
Precisely one hundred years had passed since the humiliation of 
the Emperor Henry IV.^ 

163. Pope Innocent III and Philip Augustus of France. — When 
one of the most powerful and self-reHant of all the emperors after 
Charlemagne was forced thus to bow before the papal throne, 
we are not surprised to find the kings of the different countries 
of Europe subjecting themselves obediently to the same all- 
pervading authority. French and English history, of the period 

1 See sec. 128. For further notice of Frederick Barbarossa's reign, see sees. 188 
and 255. 



I50 SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY 

covered by the pontificate of Innocent III, both afford a striking 
illustration of the subject relation which the sovereigns of Europe 
had come to sustain to the papal see. 

The French throne was at this time held by Philip Augustus 
(i 180-1223). On some pretext Philip had put away his wife 
and entered into another marriage alliance. Pope Innocent III, 
as the censor of the morals of kings as well as of the morals of 
their subjects, commanded him to take back his discarded queen, 
and upon his refusal to do so, laid France under an interdict. 
Philip was finally constrained to yield obedience to the Pope. 
This triumph of the papal see over so strong and imperious a 
sovereign has been pronounced " the proudest trophy in the 
scutcheon of Rome." 

164. Pope Innocent III and King John of England. — The story 
of Innocent's triumph over King John (i 199-12 16) of England 
is famihar. The see of Canterbury falling vacant, John ordered 
the monks who had the right of election to give the place to a 
favorite of his. They obeyed ; but the Pope immediately declared 
the election void, and caused the vacancy to be filled with one 
of his own friends, Stephen Langton. John declared that the 
Pope's archbishop should never enter England as primate, and 
proceeded to confiscate the estates of the see. Innocent now 
laid all England under an interdict, excommunicated John, and 
incited the French king, Philip Augustus, to undertake a crusade 
against the contumacious rebel. 

The outcome of the matter was that John was compelled to 
yield to the power of the Church. He gave back the lands he had 
confiscated, acknowledged Langton to be the rightful primate of 
England, and even went so far as to give England and Ireland to 
the Pope, receiving them back as a perpetual fief (12 13). In token 
of his vassalage he agreed to pay to the papal see the annual sum 
of one thousand marks sterling. This tribute money was actually 
paid, though irregularly, until the reign of Edward III (sec. 169). 

165. The Mendicant Orders, or Begging Friars.^ — The imme- 
diate successors of Innocent III found a strong support for their 

2 ¥tom/r aires, frires, " brethren." 



THE MENDICANT ORDERS 151 

authority in two new monastic orders known as the Dominican 
and the Franciscan. They were so named after their respec- 
tive founders, St. Dominic (11 70-1221) of Old Castile and St. 
Francis (about 1 182-1226) of Assisi, in Italy. The principles 
on which these fraternities were established were very different 
from those which had shaped all previous monastic orders. 
Speaking in general terms, until now the monk had sought 
cloistral solitude primarily in order to escape from the world, 
and through penance and prayer and contemplation to work 
out his own salvation. In the new orders the members instead 
of withdrawing from the world were to remain in it and give 
themselves wholly to the work of securing the salvation of others. 

Again, the orders were also as orders to renounce all earthly 
possessions, and, "espousing Poverty as a bride," to rely entirely 
for support upon the daily and voluntary alms of the pious.^ 
Hitherto, while the individual members of a monastic order must 
espouse extreme poverty, the house or fraternity might possess 
any amount of communal wealth. This had led to indolence 
and laxity of discipline, and the espousal of poverty by the new 
brotherhood was a protest against the luxurious habits of the old 
orders. 

There was at first a wide difference between the two fraternities. 
St. Francis and the disciples whom his boundless self-sacrificing 
charity drew about him devoted themselves, in imitation of Christ 
and the apostles, to preaching the gospel to the poor and outcast, 
and to visiting those who were sick and in prison. St. Dominic 
made his appeal to the higher and cultured class. He conceived 
his mission to be the combating of heresy, with which the intel- 
lectual ferment of the times had begun to fill Christendom. 

These different tendencies of the two great founders are tersely 
expressed in the respective titles given them : St. Francis was 
called the "Father of the poor"; St. Dominic, the "Hammer 

8 The Mendicant Friars soon came to interpret their vow of poverty more liberally, 
and believed that they met its obligations when they put the title of the property 
they acquired in the hands of the Pope, while they themselves simply enjoyed the 
use of it. The new fraternities grew in time to be among the richest of the monastic 
orders. 



152 SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY 

of the heretics." But notwithstanding that the differing genius 
of the two saints left at first a distinct impress upon their respec- 
tive orders, still each fraternity in time borrowed much from the 
other and the two finally became very much alike. 

The new fraternities grew and spread with marvelous rapidity, 
and in less than a generation they had quite overshadowed all 
the old monastic orders of the Church. The popes conferred 
upon them many and special privileges, and gradually freed 
them from all episcopal control. They in turn became the 
stanchest friends and supporters of the Roman see. They 
formed a regular, well-drilled, obedient papal soldiery, occupy- 
ing every point of vantage in Western Christendom. They were 
to the Papacy of the thirteenth century what the Benedictines 
had been to Pope Gregory VII, or what the later order of the 
Jesuits was to be to the papal Church of the period of the 
Reformation. . 

1 66. The Papacy brings the Empire to Virtual Ruin. — We 
have just seen how the imperial power in the person of one of 
the greatest of the House of Hohenstaufen was humbled by the 
papal authority. We have now to witness the utter ruin of this 
proud house and the downfall of the Empire as a real international 
force in European affairs. 

The Empire fell at the very moment of the culmination of its 
glory, if not of its power, under the Hohenstaufen Frederick II 
(i 2 1 2-1 250), whom the historian Freeman ventures to pronounce 
" the most gifted of the sons of men." No Emperor before him 
had conceived a loftier ideal of the world empire, nor had any 
of his predecessors, after the great Charles, by virtue of personal 
qualities imparted to the imperial office such glamour and 
brilliancy. 

But there were many elements of weakness in the Empire, — 
selfish ambitions among the German princes, rival aspirants for 
the imperial crown, national and municipal sentiment in Italy, 
and the jealousy of outside rulers. All these elements of discon- 
tent and opposition were utiUzed by the popes to effect the 
undoing of the Emperor. Throughout his long reign, laboring 



liands of the ^ 

HOLY ROMAX EMPIRE 

under the Franeonian Emperors 

10S4.11S5 ^ 




THE REVOLT OF THE NATIONS 153 

much of the time under all the disabilities of an excommuni- 
cate and with his authority in every part of his extended domin- 
ions undermined by the hostile activity of the papal agents, the 
Mendicant Friars, Frederick fought for the maintenance of the 
dignity and supremacy of the imperial power. He died in 1250 
with the heavy consciousness of failure. Pursued by the hostility 
of the popes, his posterity was extirpated root and branch. 

After Frederick II the Empire was never again a real world 
power. But the emperors in maintaining so long the struggle 
with the Papacy had given time for a new power to arise, which 
was destined to avenge them in the overthrow of the Papacy as 
an international lay authority. This new power was the awakening 
nations. 

167. The Revolt of the Nations. — The fourteenth century 
marks the turning point in the history of the temporal power 
of the Papacy. In the course of that century the lay rulers in 
several of the leading countries of Europe, supported by their 
subjects, succeeded in regaining their lost independence. France, 
Germany, and England successively revolted against the Roman 
see — the expression is not too strong — and formally denied the 
right of the Pope to interfere in their political or governmental 
affairs. 

But it should be carefully noted that the leaders of this revolt 
against the secular domination of the Papacy did not think of 
challenging the spiritual authority of the Pope as the supreme 
head of the Church. Their attitude was wholly like that of the 
Italians of our own day, who, while dispossessing the Pope of the 
last remnant of his temporal sovereignty, abate nothing of their 
veneration for him as the Vicar of God in all things moral and 
spiritual. 

168. Pope Boniface VIII and Philip the Fair of France. — It was 
during the pontificate of Boniface VIII (i 294-1 303) that the 
secular authority of the popes received a severe blow and began 
rapidly to decline. Boniface held Gregory VII's exalted views of 
the prerogatives of the papal office. Taking as his warrant these 
words of Scripture, " Behold I have set thee over kingdoms and 



154 SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY 

empires," * he assumed an attitude towards the lay rulers which 
was certain to bring the ecclesiastical and civil authorities into 
angry and violent collision. In the year 1296 he issued a bull in 
which, under pain of excommunication, he forbade all ecclesias- 
tical persons, without papal permission, to pay taxes in any form 
levied by lay rulers. All civil rulers of whatsoever name, — baron, 
duke, prince, king, or emperor, — who should presume to impose 
upon ecclesiastics taxes of any kind, were also to incur the same 
sentence.^ 

Philip of France regarded the papal claims as an encroachment 
upon the civil authority. The contention between him and the 
Pope speedily grew into a bitter and undignified quarrel. In one 
of his letters to Boniface, Philip addressed the pontiff in words of 
unseemly and studied rudeness. Philip was bold because he knew 
that his people were with him. The popular feehng was given 
.expression in a famous States-General which the king summoned 
in 1302, and in another called together the next year. The three 
estates of the realm, — the nobiHty, the clergy, and the commons, 
— declared that the Pope had no authority in France in poHtical 
matters; that the French king had no superior save God. For 
the maintenance of the ancient liberties of the French nation 
they pledged to Philip their fortunes and their lives. 

The end was soon reached. At Anagni, in Italy, a band of 
soldiers in the French pay, with every indignity, accompanied by 
blows, made Boniface a prisoner. After three days he was set 
free by friends and returned to Rome, only, however, to be there 
made the victim of fresh insults. In a few days he died, broken- 
hearted, it is said, at the age of eighty-seven (1303). 

By all historians of the rise and decline of the temporal power 
of the popes, the scene at Anagni is placed for historical instruc- 
tion alongside that enacted more than two centuries eariier at 
Canossa (sec. 128). The contrasted scenes cannot fail to im- 
press one deeply with the vast vicissitudes in the fortunes of the 
mediaeval Papacy. 

4 Jer. i. 10. 

5 This is the celebrated bull known as Clericis Laicos. See Henderson's Select 
Historical Documents^ p. 432. 



THE POPES AT AVIGNON 155 

169. Removal of the Papal Seat to Avignon (1309-13 7 6) ; 
Revolt of Germany and England. — In 1309, through the concur- 
rence of various influences, the papal seat was removed from 
Rome to Avignon, in Provence, adjoining the frontier of France. 
Here it remained for a space of nearly seventy years, an era 
known in Church history as the " Babylonian Captivity." While 
it was established here all the popes were Frenchmen and their 
policies were largely dictated by the French kings. Thus the 
Papacy lost that character of universality which had been the 
basis of its influence and strength. Under these circumstances 
it was but natural that outside of France there should be stirred 
up a more and more angry protest against the interference of the 
popes in civil matters. The measures taken at this time by the 
national assemblies of Germany and England, in both of which 
countries a national sentiment was springing up, show how com- 
pletely the Papacy had lost prestige as an international power. 

In 1338 the German princes with whom rested the right 
of electing the German king, in opposing the papal claims, 
declared that the German Emperor derived all his powers from 
God through them and not from the Pope. The German Diet 
indorsed this declaration, and the principle that the German 
Emperor, as to his election and the exercise of his functions, is 
independent of the papal see became from that time forward a 
part of the German constitution. 

A little later (in 1366), during the reign of Edward III, the 
EngUsh Parliament, acting in a like spirit and temper, put an end 
to English vassalage to Rome by formally refusing to pay the 
tribute pledged by King John,^ and by repudiating wholly the 
claims of the popes upon England as a fief of the holy see. 

170. The Great Schism (1378-1417). — The stirring of the 
national sentiment in several of the countries of Europe was not 
the only disastrous result to the Papacy of the Babylonian exile. 
The removal of the papal court from Rome awakened great dis- 
content in Italy. Rome without the Pope was a widowed city. 
It was torn by rival factions, its buildings were falling into ruins, 

6 See sec. 164. The payment of this tribute had fallen into arrears. 



156 SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY 

and cattle " were grazing even to the foot of the altar " in the 
churches of St. Peter and the Lateran. 

The return of the popes to Rome was imperatively necessary 
if they were to retain any authority in Italy. Finally, Pope Greg- 
ory XI was persuaded to break away from the influence of the 
French king and transfer the papal seat once more to the Eternal 
City. This was in 1377. The following year Gregory died, and 
the college of cardinals elected as his successor an Italian prelate, 
who took the name of Urban VI. The new Pope unfortunately 
was of a harsh and imperious disposition. His discourteous treat- 
ment of the French cardinals angered them, and they, denying 
the validity of his election, set up an antipope, who under the 
name of Clement VII established his court at Avignon. Such was 
the beginning of the Great Schism (1378). 

The spectacle of two rival popes, each claiming to be the right- 
ful successor of St. Peter and each denouncing the other, nat- 
urally gave the reverence which the world had so generally held 
for the Roman see a rude shock, and one from which it never 
fully recovered. 

171. The Church Councils of Pisa (1409) and Constance (1414- 
14 1 8). — For the lifetime of a generation all Western Christen- 
dom was deeply agitated by the bitter and unseemly quarrel. No 
peaceful solution of the difficulty seemed possible. Some even 
favored a resort to force. The faculties of the University of Paris 
invited suggestions as to the best means of ending the schism, 
They received ten thousand written opinions. The drift of these 
was in favor of an ecumenical council. Finally, in 1409, a council 
of the Church assembled at Pisa for the purpose of composing 
the unfortunate feud. This council deposed both popes and elected 
Alexander V as the supreme head of the Church. But matters 
instead of being mended hereby were only made worse ; for neithei 
of the deposed pontiffs would lay down his authority in obedience 
to the demands of the council, and consequently there were now 
three popes instead of two. 

In 14 1 4 another council was called at Constance for the settle- 
ment of the growing dispute. One of the claimants resigned and 



A SPIRITUAL THEOCRACY 157 

the other two were deposed. A new pope was then elected, the 
choice of the assembly falling upon an Italian cardinal, who became 
Pope Martin V (i 4 1 7). In his person the Catholic world was again 
united under a single spiritual head. The schism was outwardly 
healed, but the wound had been too deep not to leave permanent 
scars upon the Church. 

The Roman pontiffs, although the battles of the lost cause 
were fought over again and again in different countries, were 
never able, after the events of the fourteenth century, to exer- 
cise such authority over the kings of Europe, or exact from 
them such obedience in civil affairs, as had been possible for 
the popes of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The splendid 
ideal of Hildebrand, though so nearly realized, had at last, as to 
one half of what he purposed, proved an utter failure. 

172. The Papacy remains a Spiritual Theocracy. — We say 
that .the Roman pontiffs failed as to one half of their purpose ; 
for while they failed to make good their supremacy in temporal 
affairs, they did succeed in establishing and perpetuating an 
absolute spiritual dominion, their plenary authority in all mat- 
ters of faith being to-day acknowledged by more than one half 
of all those who bear the narrie of Christian. 

The Council of Constance, indeed, decreed that the Pope is 
subject to an ecumenical council, and that a decision of the Roman 
see may be appealed from to the judgment of the Church gathered 
in one of these great assemblies, which were to be convened at 
least every ten years. But Martin V, the Pope elected by this 
same council, in opposition to its edicts, issued a bull declaring 
" it unlawful for any one either to appeal from the judgment of 
the apostolic see or to reject its decisions in matters of faith." 
On the other hand, the Council of Basel, — the third and last of 
the great reforming councils of the fifteenth century, — which 
assembled in 143 1, setting itself against the principle of papal 
autocracy, declared any one appealing from a general council of 
the Church to the Pope to be guilty of heresy. 

The papal party, the party of absolutism, carried the day. Only 
one ecumenical council has been held since the Council of Trent, 



158 SUPREMACY OF THE PAPACY 

which was called in 1545 to pronounce upon the doctrines of 
Luther; and this assembly (the Vatican Council, 186 9- 18 70) pro- 
mulgated the decisive edict of papal infallibility. 

And thus the Papacy, though its temporal power has been 
entirely taken from it, and its spiritual authority rejected in gen- 
eral by the northern nations, still remains, as Macaulay says, " not 
in decay, not a mere antique, but full of life and youthful vigor." 
The Pope is to-day, in the view of more than half of Christendom, 
the infallible head of a Church that, in the famous words of the 
brilliant writer just quoted, "was great and respected before 
the Saxon had set foot on Britain, before the Frank had passed the 
Rhine, when Grecian eloquence still flourished in Antioch, when 
idols were still worshiped in the temple of Mecca. And she may 
still exist in undiminished vigour when some traveler from New 
Zealand shall, in the midst of a vast solitude, take his stand on a 
broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's." 

Selections from the Sources. — Henderson, Select Historical Docu- 
ments^ p. 430, " John's Concession of England to the Pope " ; p. 432, " The 
Bull ♦ Clericis Laicos ' " ; p. 435, « The Bull ' Unam Sanctam.' " Robin- 
son, Readings ijt European History, vol. i, chap. xxi. For the Mendi- 
cant Friars : The Mirror of Perfection (ed. by Paul Sabatier and trans, 
from the Latin by Sebastian Evans). This is the life of St. Francis written by 
a companion and disciple. It is a wonderful story simply and lovingly told. 

Secondary Works. — Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire, chap, x' , "The 
Emperors in Italy: Frederick Barbarossa," and chap, xiii, "Fall of the 
Hohenstaufen." Pastor, The History of the Popes, vol. i (Catholic). 
Emerton, MedicBval Europe, sections of chaps, ix and x. Thatcher 
and ScHWiLL, Ezirope in the Middle Ages, chap. xxi. Barry, The Papal ■ 
Monarchy, chaps, xviii-xxv. Adams, Civilization during the Middle Ages, 
chap. X (last part) and chap. xvi. Alzog, Universal Church History, 
vol. ii, pp. 573-586, for Innocent III and his relations to the princes of 
Europe ; and pp. 614-630, for Boniface VIII and Philip the Fair. Bal- 
ZANI, The Popes and the Hohenstaufen. Fisher, History of the Christian 
Church, pp. 240-264. Tout, The Empire and the Papacy, chaps, xi, xiv, 
xvi, and xxi. Freeman, Historical Essays (First Series), "Frederick II." 
Sabatier, Life of St. Francis of Assisi ; a book of genius and spiritual 
insight. Jessopp, The Coming of the Friars. Creighton, History of 
the Papacy, vol. i, "The Great Schism; The Council of Constance." 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Incidents of the Peace of Venice (1177)- 
2. St. Francis of Assisi. 3. St. Dominic. 4. The popes at Avignon. 



CHAPTER XIV 
THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

I. The Mongols 

173. The Three Invasions. — We have witnessed two inva- 
sions of civilized Europe, one by the Germanic tribes from the 
north and another by the Saracens from the south, and have 
noted the effects of each upon the course of general history. 
Our attention is now drawn to a third invasion, this time from 
the east, by nomadic races of Asia, — the Mongols and the 
Ottoman Turks.^ 

The ultimate results for European civilization of the Teutonic 
invasion were, as we have seen, salutary and beneficial, because 
of the fresh mental vigor and the political capacity of the in- 
vaders. The consequences, direct and indirect, of the Arabian 
invasion were mixed, and it would be difficult to make an appraise- 
ment of its net effects. The results of the Turanian irruption, on 
the other hand, were almost wholly disastrous, as we shall learn, 
to European civilization. The growth of the promising Russian 
nation was checked, while all the countries and races of South- 
eastern Europe were subjected for centuries to the degrading 
domination of a race alien in blood, in social institutions, in moral 
ideals, and in religious belief. Indeed, some of the European 
lands thus inundated have remained submerged beneath Asiatic 
barbarism up to the present day. 

This comparatively late invasion of Europe by Asiatic nomads is 
noteworthy especially for the reason that it was the most successful 

1 The Mongols and Turks belong to that great family of predominantly nomadic 
or pastoral tribes and nations variously designated as the Scythic, the Turanian, 
or the Ural-Altaic, and having the steppes of Central and Northern Asia as their 
chief original seat. 



l6o THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

of all the attacks of Asia upon Europe during historic times, and 
the last conquest of European territory by an Asiatic race. 

174. The Conquests of the Mongols. — It was about the time 
of the opening of the Crusades when the Mongols, cruel and 
untamed nomads bred on the steppes of Central and Eastern 



Fig. 27. — Hut-Wagon of the Medieval Tartars. (From Yule's 

Book of Ser Marco Polo) 

" The wandering Scyths who dwell 
In, latticed huts high-poised on easy wheels." 

^SCHYLUS, Prom'. Vinct., 709-10; quoted by Yule 

Asia, that nursery of conquering races, began to set up a new 
dominion among the various tribes of Mongolia. Their first great 
chieftain was Jenghiz Khan (i 206-1 227), the most terrible 
scourge that ever afflicted the human race. At the head of innu- 
merable hordes composed largely of Turkish tribes, callous and 
pitiless in their slaughterings as though their victims belonged to 
another species than themselves, Jenghiz traversed with sword 
and torch a great part of Asia. He conquered all the northern 
part of China, and then turning westward overran Turkestan and 
Persia. Cities disappeared as he advanced; populous plains 
were transformed into silent deserts. Before death overtook him 
he had extended his authority to the Dnieper in Russia and to 
the valley of the Indus. Even in death he claimed his victims : 



THE CONQUESTS OF THE MONGOLS 



l6l 



at his tomb forty maidens were slain that their spirits might go 
to serve him in the other world. 

The vast domains of Jenghiz passed into the hands of his son 
Oktai (d. 1 241), a worthy successor of the great conqueror. He 
pushed outwards still further the boundaries of the empire in the 
east as well as in the west of Asia, and made a threatening inva- 
sion into Europe. This western expedition was led by the cele- 
brated Batu. A large part of Russia, Poland, and Hungary were 
overrun and devastated. The cities of Moscow, Kiev, Pesth, and 




The Mongol Empire under Jenghis Khan and his Immediate 
Successors (thirteenth century) 

The shaded area shows the countries either under the direct rule of the 
Mongols or tributary to them 

many others were burned and their inhabitants slain. In the 
space of two or three terrible years (i 238-1 241) almost half of 
Europe was pitilessly ravaged. The inhabitants of the other half 
seemed to be stunned. They made no concerted efforts to check 
the progress of the invaders. They apparently regarded the 



l62 THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

visitation as though it were some destructive convulsion of nature 
for which there was no help or remedy. Fortunately, just at this 
critical moment Oktai died. Batu was recalled to Asia, and the 
civilization of Western Europe escaped the threatened destruction. 

One of the most noted of the successors of Oktai was Kublai 
Khan (1259— 1294), who made Cambalu, the modern Peking, his 
royal seat, and there received ambassadors and visitors from all 
parts of the world. It was at the court of this prince that the 
celebrated Italian traveler Marco Polo resided many years and 
gained that valuable and quickening knowledge of the Far East 
which he communicated to Europe in his remarkable work of 
travels and observations. 

Upon the death of Kublai Khan the immoderately extended 
and loosely knit empire fell into disorder and separated into 
many petty states. It was restored by Timur or Tamerlane 
(= Timurlenk, "Timur the lame," 1369-1405), a remote rela- 
tive of Jenghiz Khan. He made Samarkand in Central Asia his 
capital and seems to have deliberately set about reducing the 
whole earth to obedience, He is said to have declared that 
" since God is one and hath no partner, therefore the vicegerent 
over the lands of the Lord must be one." His dominions came 
to embrace a great part of Asia. 

Timur's immense empire crumbled to pieces after his death. 
His descendant Baber invaded India (1525) and estabhshed 
there what became known as the Kingdom of the Great Moguls. 
This Mongol state lasted over two hundred years, — until destroyed 
by the English in the eighteenth century. The magnificence of 
the court of the Great Moguls at Delhi and Agra is one of the 
most splendid traditions of the East. These foreign rulers gave 
India some of her finest architectural monuments. The mauso- 
leum at Agra, known as the Taj Mahal, is one of the most beau- 
tiful structures in the world. ^ 

2 Wherever we find an upspringing of art and architecture under the Mongols we 
shall not be wrong in attributing it to the influence upon them of the civilizations 
with which they came in contact in China, Persia, India, and Western Asia. Their 
architects and artisans were generally furnished by the conquered races or by the 
cities of Western Europe. 



RESULTS OF THE MONGOL OUTBREAK 163 

175. Historical Results of the Mongol Outbreak. — Asia has 
never recovered from the terrible devastation wrought by the 
Mongol conquerors. Many districts swarming with life were 
swept clean of their population by these destroyers of the race 
and have remained to this day desolate as the tomb. But it is 
the relation of the Mongol eruption to the history of the West 
that chiefly concerns us at present. This revolution had signifi- 
cance for European history, as we have already intimated, almost 




Fig. 28. — The Taj Mahal at Agra. (From a photograph) 

This magnificent monument was erected by the Mogul emperor Shah Jehan 
(1628-1658), for a favorite wife who died in 1631 

solely on account of the Mongols having laid the yoke of their 
power for a long time — for about three centuries — upon the 
Eastern Slavs. This was some such calamity for Russia as the 
later conquests of the Ottoman Turks were for the lands of South- 
eastern Europe. This Tartar domination, as we shall learn, left 
deep and permanent traces upon the Russian character and upon 
Russian history (sec. 265). 

But there was some good issuing out of so much evil. As a 
consequence of the establishment of the extended empire of the 
Mongols there was better communication on the land side between 



l64 THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

Europe and Eastern Asia than had ever existed before or was 
destined to exist again until the construction in our own day of 
the Trans-Siberian Railroad. The way was long and wearisome 
but comparatively safe, and consequently it was traversed back 
and forth by embassies between the European courts and the 
Mongol potentates, and by missionary-monks, artisans, merchants, 
and explorers. Marco Polo is the type and symbol of it all. 
Through this means there were brought into Europe from the 
Far East various arts, ideas, and inventions which undoubtedly 
contributed to the revival of culture in the West and to the 
inauguration of a new age for the European peoples. 

II. The Ottoman Turks 

176. The Beginnings of the Ottoman Empire. — The latest, 
most permanent, and most important historically of all the Tura- 
nian sovereignties was that established by the Ottoman Turks. 
The first appearance of this folk upon the arena of history was 
dramatic, and prophetic of their conquering career. About the 
middle of the thirteenth century a chieftain, accompanied by a 
band of several hundred horsemen, was riding over the hills of 
Anatolia (Asia Minor) in the neighborhood of Angora. Unex- 
pectedly the wanderers came upon a battle in full progress, — 
battles were to be found almost anywhere in those days in those 
parts. The cavaliers, through sheer love of a fight, for they were 
totally ignorant alike of who the combatants were and why they 
thus fought together, dashed into the thickest of the battle, 
chivalrously taking the part of the weaker and yielding side and 
quickly turning the fight in its favor. It developed that the 
"beneficiaries of their chivalrous act" were Seljuk Turks form- 
ing the army of the sultan of Iconium. The grateful sultan 
invited the strangers to abide among his people and offered them 
lands for their flocks. They accepted the invitation, and the 
settlement thus formed became the nucleus of the great Ottoman 
Empire.^ 

3 Creasy, History of the Ottoman Turks, chap. L 



THE JANIZARIES 165 

The name of the hero of this story was Ertoghrul. The empire, 
the germ of which he planted, bears however not his name but 
that of his son Othman,'* for the reason that the son was the first 
to assume in the new land the rank of an independent ruler. 

Gradually the Ottoman princes subjected to their rule the 
various surrounding tribes which the Mongolian conquests had 
crowded westward into. Asia Minor, and at the same time seized 
upon province after province of the Asiatic possessions of the 
Byzantine emperors. During the reign of Amurath I (136 0-13 89) 
a large part of the regions that came to be known as Turkey in 
Europe fell into their hands. 

177. The Janizaries. — The conquests of the Turks were 
greatly aided by a remarkably efficient body of soldiers knoWn 
as the Janizaries, which was organized early in the fourteenth 
century. This select corps was composed at first of the fairest 
children of Christian captives. When war ceased to furnish 
recruits, the sultans levied a tribute of children on their Chris- 
tian subjects. At one time this tribute amounted to two thousand 
boys yearly. This method of recruiting the corps was maintained 
for about three hundred years. The boys, who were generally 
received at the age of about eight, were brought up in the Moham- 
medan faith and carefully trained in military service. These " infant 
proselytes of war " formed a military body that was one of the 
chief instruments in the creation of the Ottoman Empire. 

178 . The Ottoman Advance checked by the Mongols. — Amurath I 
was followed by Bajazet I (i 347-1403), the rapid advance of 
whose conquests spread the greatest alarm throughout Central 
and Western Europe. The warriors of Hungary, Poland, and 
France gathered to arrest the menacing progress of the bar- 
barians; but the allied army, numbering a hundred thousand 
men, was cut to pieces by the sabers of the Turks on the fatal 
field of NicopoHs, in Bulgaria (1396). Thousands of the knights 
and common soldiers who were made prisoners were barbarously 
and deliberately massacred by their captors. 

* Othman I (1288-1326), or Osman, whence not only " Ottoman," but " Osmanlis," 
the favorite name which the Turks apply to themselves. 



l66 THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

The unfortunate issue of this terrible battle threw all the West 
into a perfect panic of terror. Bajazet vowed that his horse " should 
eat oats on the high altar of St. Peter's in Rome," and there 
seemed no power in Christendom to prevent the sacrilege. Before 
proceeding to fulfill this threat, Bajazet turned back to capture 
Constantinople, which he believed in the present despondent 
state of its inhabitants would make little or no resistance. 

Now just at this time Tamerlane was leading his hordes on their 
career of conquest. He directed them against the Turks in Asia 
Minor, and Bajazet was forced to raise the siege of Constantinople 
and hasten across the Bosporus to check the advance of these 
new enemies. The Turks and Mongols met upon the plains of 
Angora, where the former suffered a disastrous defeat (1402). 
This checked for a time the conquests of the Ottomans and saved 
Constantinople to Christendom for another period of fifty years. 

179. The Fall of Constantinople (1453). — The Ottomans, 
however, gradually recovered from the blow given them by the 
Mongols. By the year 142 1 they were strong enough to make 
another attempt upon Constantinople. The city was this time 
saved by the strength of its defenses. Another quarter of a cen- 
tury passed. Then finally, in the year 1453, Mohammed II the 
Great (1451-1480) laid siege to the capital with a vast army and 
fleet. The walls of the city were manned by a mere handful of 
men. After a short investment the place was taken by storm. 
The heroic Emperor, Constantine Palaeologus, refusing to live " an 
Emperor without an Empire," fell sword in hand. Of the hun- 
dred thousand inhabitants of the capital forty thousand are said 
to have been slain and fifty thousand made slaves. The Cross, 
which since the time of Constantine the Great had surmounted 
the dome of St. Sophia, was replaced by the Crescent. 

Thus fell New Rome into the hands of the barbarians of the 
East almost an exact millennium after Old Rome had passed into 
the possession of the barbarians of the West. Its fall was one of 
the most harrowing and fate- laden events in history. As Moham- 
med, like Scipio at Carthage, gazed upon the ruined city and 
the empty palace of Constantine, he is said, impressed by the 



THE OTTOMANS CHECKED 



167 



mutability of fortune, to have repeated musingly the lines of the 
Persian poet Firdusi : "The spider's web is the curtain in Caesar's 
palace ; the owl is the sentinel on the watchtower of Afrasiab." ^ 
180. The Ottomans checked by the Hungarians and the Knights 
of Rhodes. — The consternation which the fall of New Rome 
created throughout Christendom was like the dismay which filled 
the world upon the downfall of Old Rome in the fifth century. 




The Empire of the Ottoman Turks about 1464 



Europe now lay open to the invaders. The warriors of Hungary, 
however, made a valiant stand against them and succeeded in 
checking their advance upon the continent, while the Hospitalers 
(sec. 143), now established in the island of Rhodes, held them in 
restraint in the Mediterranean. Before the end of the sixteenth 
century the conquering energy of the Ottomans had about spent 
itself, and their empire had attained its greatest extent. 

The Turks have ever remained quite insensible to the influences 
of European civiHzation, and their rule has been a perfect blight 
and curse to the Christian races subjected to their authority. They 

5 Afrasiab is the name of a personage who figures in the historical legends of Persia 



l68 THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS 

have always been looked upon as intruders in Europe, and their 
presence there has led to several of the most sanguinary wars of 
modern times. Gradually they are being pushed out from their 
European possessions, and the time is probably not remote when 
they will be driven back across the Bosporus, just as the Moslem 
Moors were expelled long ago from the opposite comer of the 
continent by the Christian chivalry of Spain. 




Fig. 29. — Ruins of the Great Mosque at Samarkand 
(From Shoemaker, The Heart of the Orient') 

This stupendous structure dates from the time of Tamerlane 



Selections from the Sources. — The Book of Ser Marco Polo, 2 vols, 
(trans, by Henry Yule). The best part of these volumes is condensed in 
Noah Brooks, The Story of Marco Polo. Marco Polo resided seventeen 
years at the court of Kublai Khan at Cambalu, the modem Peking. He 
saw the Mongol court at the time of its greatest brilliancy and gave Europe 
a vivid description of what he observed and heard in an account which 
our growing knowledge of the Farther East is giving a constantly higher 
reputation for accuracy and honesty. 

Secondary Works. — Howorth, History of the Mongols from the Ninth 
to the Nineteenth Century. The best and most comprehensive work on 
the subject. Creasy, History of the Ottoman Ticrks, chaps, i-vi. Gib- 
bon, The Decline and Fall, chaps. Ixiv-lxviii. MijATOViCH, Constanti^ze, 
the Last Emperor of the Greeks ; or the Conquest of Constantinople by the 
Turks {A.D. I4S3)- The best account in English. Poole, The Story of 
Turkey, chaps, i-vii. Oman, The Story of the Byzantine Empire, chaps. 
XXV and xxvi. Freeman, The Ottoman Power in Europe, chaps, i-iv. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Marco Polo at the Mongol court. 
2. Timur the Lame. 3. The Mongols in Russia, 4. The Janizaries. 
5. The siege and capture of Constantinople by the Turks. 



CHAPTER XV 
THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

i8i. The Barbarians and the Roman Cities. — The old Roman 
towns, as points of attack and defense, suffered much durmg the 
period of the barbarian invasions. When the storm had passed, 
many of the once strong-walled towns lay "rings of ruins" on 
the wasted plains. Rome, during the Gothic wars, was for a 
time without a living soul within its walls. In Britain a consid- 
erable part of the Roman towns seem to have been virtually 
wiped out of existence by the Anglo-Saxon invaders. In South- 
ern France, in Italy, and in Spain the cities on the whole suf- 
fered less ; yet in none of the countries where they had sprung 
up and flourished under the shelter of the Roman rule did they 
wholly escape hurt and harm. 

But it was not alone the violence of the destroyers of the 
Empire that brought so many cities to ruin. What chiefly caused 
their depopulation and decay was the preference of the barba- 
rians for the open country to the city. As we have already 
learned, they had no liking for life within city walls. Hence it 
was inevitable that under the influence of the invasion, city life, 
speaking generally, should give place to country Hfe. Up to the 
eleventh century the population of Europe was essentially a rural 
population like that of Russia to-day. 

182. Rapid Development of the Cities in the Tenth and Eleventh 
Centuries. — But just as soon as the invaders had settled down 
and civihzation had begun to revive, the old Roman towns began 
gradually to assume somewhat of their former importance, and 
new ones to spring up in those provinces where they had been 
swept away, and in the countries outside of the limits of the 
ancient Empire. 

169 



I/O THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

During the tenth century Western Europe, it will be recalled, 
was terribly troubled by the Northmen, the Hungarians, and the 
Saracens (sec. 96). There being no strong central government, 
the cities, thrown upon their own resources for defense, some- 
times with and sometimes without royal or imperial sanction, 
armed their militia, perfected their municipal organization, and 
above all else surrounded themselves with walls. Strong walls were 
the only sure protection in those evil times. Thus Europe became 




Fig. 30. — The Amphitheater at Arles in Medieval Times 
(From Smith, The Troubadours at Home) 

" The amphitheater was made a fortress, packed with houses, in the eighth 
century, on account of Saracen incursions " 

thickset with strong-walled cities, the counterpart of the castles 
of the feudal lords, which were the defense of the country-side. 
183. The Towns enter the Feudal System; their Revolt. — 
When feudalism took possession of Europe the cities became a 
part of the system. They became vassals and suzerains. As 
vassals, they were of course subjected to all the incidents of 
feudal ownership.-^ They owed allegiance to their suzerain, were 

1 At first each householder in a town was a tenant of the lord of the fief, and was 
individually liable to him for rents or military service ; but later many of the towns as 
towns, that is, as corporate bodies, became responsible for the rents and services due 
the lord. It was not until the towns came to act in their corporate capacity that 
they became an important factor in the political system. 



TOWNS ENTER THE FEUDAL SYSTEM 



171 



he baron, prince, prelate, king, or emperor, and must pay him 
feudal tribute and aid him in his war enterprises. 

As the cities, through their manufactures and trade, were the 
most wealthy members of the feudal system, the lords naturally 
looked to them for money when in need. Their demands and 
exactions at last became unendurable, and a long struggle broke 
out between them and the burghers, which resulted in what is 
known as the enfranchisement of the towns. 

It was in the eleventh century that this revolt of the cities 
against the feudal lords became general. The burghers by this 
time had made their walls strong and had learned to fight, — 
if indeed they had ever forgotten that art. They became bold 
enough to defy 
their lord, — to 
shut their gates in 
the face of his tax- 
gatherer, and even 
in the face of the 
lord himself, even 
though he were 
king or emperor, 
when he came to 
parley with them. 
The contest lasted 
two centuries and 
more. 

The advantage 
in the end rested 
with the burghers. 
In process of time 
the greater number of the towns of the countries of Western 
Europe either bought with money, which was the usual mode of 
enfranchisement of English and German cities, or wrested by force 
of arms charters from their lords or suzerains. Many lords, how- 
ever, of their own free will gave charters to the towns within their 
fiefs, granting them various exemptions and privileges, for the 




Fig. 31. — A Count and his Wife granting a 
Charter to a City. (From a fifteenth-century 
manuscript ; after Lacroix) 



1/2 THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

reason that this fostered their growth and prosperity and made 
them more profitable vassals and tenants. 

In many cases the charters simply defined the ancient customs 
and privileges of the favored towns and guaranteed them against 
unreasonable and arbitrary demands on the part of their lord. 
Even this, however, was a great gain ; and as, under the protec- 
tion of their charters, the cities grew in wealth and population, 
many of them in some countries became at last strong enough 
to cast off all actual dependence upon lord or king, became in 
effect independent states, — little commonwealths. Especially 
was this true in the case of the Italian cities, and in a less 
marked degree in the case of some of the German towns. 
Respecting the fortunes of the cities in these two countries 
we shall speak with some detail in later paragraphs. 

184. The Industrial Life of the Towns; the Gilds The 

towns were the workshops of the later Middle Ages. The most 
noteworthy characteristics of their industrial life are connected 
with certain corporations or fraternities known as gilds. There 
were two chief classes of these, the gild merchant and the craft 
gilds. The gild merchant appears in the towns as soon as their 
commercial life becomes in any way active, that is to say, about 
the eleventh century. The members of the fraternity, speaking 
generally, were the chief landowners and traders of the place, and 
in many towns the city government was more or less completely 
in their hands. 

Later, as trade developed, the craftsmen began to form sepa- 
rate fellowships on the model of the earlier society. We hear 
of unions of the shoemakers, the bakers, the weavers, the spin- 
ners, the dyers, the millers, and so on to the end. In some cities 
there were upwards of fifty of these associations. 

No sooner had these plebeian societies grown strong than, in 
many of the Continental cities, they entered into a bitter struggle 
with the patrician gild merchant for a share in the municipal 
government or for participation in its trade monopoly. This 
conflict, in some of its features, reminds us of that between 
patrician and plebeian in ancient Rome. It lasted for two 



THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 173 

centuries and more, — the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries mark 
the height of the struggle on the Continent, — and during all 
this time filled the towns with strenuous confusion. The outcome, 
speaking in general terms, was the triumph of the craftsmen. 

The internal history of the towns during the fourteenth and 
fifteenth centuries is very largely the story of the gilds in their 
manifold actiyities. This story, however, it is impossible to give 
even in outline in our short space. We must content ourselves 
with having merely indicated the place of these interesting 
fraternities in the life of the mediaeval towns. 

185. The Hanseatic League. — When, in the eleventh and 
twelfth centuries, the towns of Northern Europe began to extend 
their commercial connections, the greatest drawback to their 
trade was the insecurity and disorder that everywhere prevailed. 
The trader who intrusted his goods to the overland routes was 
in danger of losing them at the hands of the robber nobles, who 
watched all the lines of travel and either robbed the merchant 
outright or levied an iniquitous toll upon his goods. Nor was 
the way by sea beset with less peril. Piratical crafts scoured the 
waters and made booty of any luckless merchantman they might 
overpower or lure to wreck upon the dangerous shores. 

Finally, about the middle of the thirteenth century, some of 
the German cities, among which Liibeck and Hamburg were 
prominent, began to form temporary alliances for protecting 
their merchants against pirates and robbers. These transient 
leagues finally led to the formation of the celebrated Hanseatic ^ 
League, whose firm organization as a political power dates from 
near the middle of the fourteenth century. The confederation 
came to embrace eighty or more — ■ the number is uncertain — of 
the principal towns of North Germany. The league organized 
armies, equipped navies, and exercised all the powers of sover- 
eignty. It was "mediaeval Germany on the sea." 

In order to facilitate the trading operations of its members, the 
league maintained in different foreign cities factories, magazines, 
inns, and chapels. These stations were somewhat like the 

2 From the old German hansa. a " confederation " or " union." 



174 



THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 



sel'.lements established to-day by Europeans in the countries of the 
Far East. The most noted centers of the foreign trade of the 
confederation were the cities of Bruges, London, Bergen, Wisby, 
and Novgorod. The league thus became a vast monopoly, which 
endeavored to control in the interests of its own members the 
entire commerce of Northern Europe. 

1 86. Causes of the Dissolution of the League Numerous 

causes concurred to undermine the prosperity of the Hansa towns 




Bergen 



The Hansa Towns and their Chief Foreign Settlements 



and to bring about the dissolution of the league. Most promi- 
nent among these was the development of the manufactures and 
trade of the peoples whom the German merchants had for a time 
commercially subjected. The native traders now naturally became 
jealous of these foreigners, and the sovereigns of the land in 
which they had been allowed to establish settlements found it to 
their interest to annul the privileges formerly granted them and 
to encourage home industry and trade. 

Another agency of disruption was the great maritime dis- 
coveries of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which ,trans- 
ferred the centers of commercial activity as well from the Baltic 



EARLY GROWTH OF THE ITALIAN CITIES 175 

as from the Mediterranean ports to the harbors on the Atlantic 
seaboard. Finally, the Reformation and the accompanying reli- 
gious wars in Germany, which brought many of the Hansa towns 
to utter ruin, completed the dissolution of the league. 

187. Causes of the Early Growth of the Italian Cities. — But it 
was in Italy that the mediaeval municipalities had their most 
remarkable development and acquired the greatest power and 
influence. A variety of circumstances and causes concurred in 
promoting their early and rapid growth. 

First, these cities were the heirs of the great Roman past in a 
truer sense than were any of the towns outside of Italy. If in 
most of them no part of the actual machinery of the ancient 
municipal government was any longer in existence, still the 
inspiring memories and traditions of old-time liberties had not 
yet been forgotten. 

Second, their political development was favored by the destruc- 
tion of the unity of the peninsula by the Lombards (sec. 13). 
There being no strong central authority, the cities came naturally 
to assume large governmental responsibihties and to stand to 
one another in the relation of independent states. 

Third, the weak development of feudalism in the peninsula fav- 
ored the growth of the municipalities. The cities, instead of being 
brought in vassalage to the barons as happened almost everywhere 
else, brought the barons themselves into subjection. The lords, 
either through choice or by compulsion, became citizens of the 
towns. This absorption of the feudal nobility into the citizenship 
of the towns greatly strengthened them and contributed largely 
to the development of that diversity of life and that extraordinary 
energy of character which distinguished the inhabitants of these 
city-republics. 

Fourth, the long struggle between the Papacy and the Empire 
tended greatly to enhance the Hberties of the Italian cities. The 
Pope and Emperor were constantly bidding against each other for 
the help of the cities, — a situation which they took advantage 
of to make themselves practically independent of all superior 
control. 



.176 THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

But the main direct cause of the material prosperity and 
indirectly of the pohtical power of the most important of the 
Italian coast cities was their trade with the East, and the enor- 
mous impulse it received from the Crusades. Particularly did the 
merchants of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa become immensely rich 
through the vast transport business thrown into their hands by 
the crusading movement. 

The political history of these ItaHan cities is very intricate and 
uninteresting; but their social, artistic, and commercial records 
form the most brilliant pages of the annals of the Middle Ages. 
There are, however, three important matters which may be con- 
sidered as belonging to their general political history : (i) the 
formation of the Lombard League; (2) the dissensions of the 
twelfth and thirteenth centuries; and (3) the rise of despots in 
the cities. We shall speak of each of these matters under a sepa- 
rate head, and then shall proceed to notice some of the more 
interesting and instructive circumstances in the separate com- 
mercial or intellectual life of the representative states of Venice, 
Genoa, and Florence. 

188. The Lombard League. — As we have previously noticed, 
a great crisis in the history of the Italian cities was reached when 
Frederick Barbarossa became Emperor (sec. 162). Frederick 
held very lofty views of the Empire and its providential place in 
the government of the world, so that not merely a very natural 
ambition but conceptions of duty caused him to maintain unyield- 
ingly the imperial rights. He was influenced doubtless by the 
civil lawyers who just now were engaging with great enthusiasm 
in the study of the old Roman law. Now this law had made the 
authority of the Emperor over the cities of the Empire virtually 
absolute. It was very natural then that Frederick, under the in- 
fluence of the jurists, should have persuaded himself that the 
Italian cities had been making encroachments upon the imperial 
authority, and that it would be right for him to resume the power 
which his immediate predecessors had allowed to slip out of their 
hands. He would rule as had Justinian, Charlemagne, and Otto I. 
With Frederick entertaining such conceptions of the imperial 



THE LOMBARD LEAGUE 



177 



prerogatives, a struggle between him and the ItaHan cities was in- 
evitable. To them his claims meant tyranny ; to him theirs meant 
license and anarchy. Consequently, when Frederick attempted to 
place his own judges in the towns, to take away from them the 
right of waging private war, and to place other restrictions upon 
them, there came an armed conflict which lasted for thirty years. 
We may say of this war between the Emperor and his city vassals, 
as has been said of our late Civil War, that it was fought to get 
a definition of a constitution, — the unwritten constitution of the 
Holy Roman Empire. 

Frederick repeatedly descended into Italy with an army to 
enforce his authority, and captured and burned several of the 
cities of Lombardy. At last the powerful city of Milan, which 
had heroically withstood his arms, fell into his hands. He scat- 
tered its inhabitants in villages, after the old Greek fashion of 
destroying a city, and razed to the ground its walls and buildings 
(1162). 

A confederation known as the Lombard League was now formed 
by the exiled Milanese and a large number of the cities of North- 
ern Italy for the purpose of avenging the wrongs of Milan and 
resisting the Emperor's pretensions. The banded cities stood firm 
for their cherished liberties. Finally, on the field of Legnano, in 
1 176, the Milanese and their allies, rallying around the sacred 
carroccio,^ inflicted upon the imperial army an overwhelming 
defeat. A truce of six years was the prelude to the Peace of Con- 
stance (11 83). By this agreement the Emperor's authority over 
the cities was reduced virtually to a titular and idle suzerainty,* 
while their right to manage their own internal affairs and to wage 
private war was acknowledged. 

3 In the eleventh century Heribert, Archbishop of Milan, invented for that city an 
ensign consisting of a pole bearing the crucifix and raised on a chariot, — hence called 
the carroccio. The car was drawn by four yokes of oxen and was, like the ancient 
Ark of the Israelites, of which it was a sort of imitation, the rallying point of the 
army on the battlefield. Many of the other cities followed the example of Milan, and 
under these curious standards, "the sign and symbol of all they held dear," the 
Italian cities marched in their short but brilliant career of freedom. 

4 The Emperor retained the right to place representatives in the cities and to 
receive food, forage, and lodging for his army when he might chance to visit Italy. 



178 THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

189. Dissensions among the Italian Cities ; the Age of Liberty. 

— The cities had preserved or rather recovered their liberties. 
They had secured at Constance confirmation particularly of the 
cherished right of private war. This was a fatal privilege. They 
misused it and brought upon themselves no end of trouble and 
suffering. For a century and more they waged ever-renewed, 
bitter, and sanguinary wars upon one another. 

The causes of dissension were many and near at hand. "The 
cities fought," says Symonds, "for command of seaports, passes, 
rivers, roads, and all the avenues of wealth and plenty." But 
besides the numerous causes of strife between the different re- 
publics, there were elements of discord within the walls of each 
individual city. The struggle between the Papacy and the Empire, 
in which the Italians perforce took part, divided the population of 
each town into two parties, — the Ghibellines, who adhered to the 
Emperor, and the Guelphs,^ who espoused the cause of his enemy, 
the Pope. The history of civil dissensions might be searched in 
vain for a parallel to the bitterness and vindictiveness with which 
the struggle between these parties was carried on for centuries. 

Still another very fruitful source of disorder and violence in the 
cities was the presence there of the feudal lords (sec. 187). In 
other lands these quarrelsome folk fought out their feuds in the 
open country ; in Italy, in the streets of the cities. 

Nevertheless, though fraught with so many evils, " Liberty," as 
declares Herodotus in speaking of democratic Athens, "Liberty is 
a brave thing." The strenuous freedom of the Italian cities fos- 
tered great talents and great virtues in their citizens. The eminent 
Florentine historian Guicciardini attributes the prosperity and 
brilliant culture of the Italian cities during the twelfth and thir- 
teenth centuries to the local independence they then enjoyed. 

190. The Rise of Despots. — The constant wars of the Italian 
cities with each other and the incessant strife of parties within 

5 These names, which were of German origin, became at last mere party shib- 
boleths. Speaking in a very general way, it may be said that the Ghibellines repre- 
sented the intrusive Teutonic element and favored a feudal, aristocratic organization 
of society, while the Guelphs represented the old Roman population and were 
supporters of liberal democratic institutions. 



THE RISE OF DESPOTS 179 

each community led to the same issue as that to which tended 
the endless contentions and divisions of the Greek cities in ancient 
times. Their democratic institutions were overthrown, internecine 
war and strife having resulted in anarchy, and anarchy having led, 
as always, to tyranny. 

By the end of the thirteenth century almost all the republics of 
Northern and Central Italy down to the papal states, save Venice, 
Genoa, and the cities of Tuscany, had fallen into the hands of 
domestic tyrants, many of whom by their crimes and their intol- 
erable tyranny rendered themselves as odious as the worst of the 
tyrants who usurped supreme power in the free cities of ancient 
Hellas. They possessed, many of them, a remarkable " energy for 
crime." Their strenuous wickedness filled the land with violence 
and terror. 

One thing which enabled these usurpers to seize the supreme 
power in the cities was the decay of the military spirit in their 
inhabitants. The burghers became immersed in business and dele- 
gated the defense of their cities to mercenaries. The captains of 
these hirelings were known as condottieri. Some of them were 
foreign adventurers ; all were soldiers of fortune. They found it 
easy to overthrow the liberties of the cities which they had been 
hired to defend. 

We shall now relate some circumstances, for the most part of 
a commercial or social character, which concern some of the 
most renowned of the Italian city-states. 

191. Venice Venice, the most famous of the Italian cities, 

had its beginnings in the fifth century in the rude huts of some 
refugees who fled out into the marshes of the Adriatic to escape 
the fury of the Huns of Attila. Here, secure from the pursuit of 
the barbarians, who were unprovided with boats, they gradually 
built up, on some low islets, a number of httle villages, which 
finally, towards the close of the seventh century, coalesced to form 
a single city, at whose head was placed a ruler bearing the title 
of Duke, or Doge, a name destined to acquire a wide renown. 

Conquests and negotiations gradually extended century after 
century the possessions of the island republic, until she finally 



i8o 



THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 



came to control the coast and waters of the Eastern Mediter- 
ranean in much the same way that Carthage had mastery of the 
Western Mediterranean at the time of the First Punic War. Even 
before the Crusades her trade with the East was very extensive, 
and by those expeditions was expanded into enormous dimensions. 
The sea between Italy and the ports of Egypt and Syria was 
whitened with the sails of her transports and war galleys. It will 
be recalled that she took part in the Fourth Crusade, which 
resulted in the capture of Constantinople by the Latin Christians 
(sec. 148). As her share of the divided lands of the Eastern 
^ Empire she received 

r^ the Peloponnesus, most 

of the Greek islands, and 
the shore lands of the 
Hellespont, — a goodly 
empire of the sea. 

Venice was at the 
height of her power dur- 
ing the thirteenth, four- 
teenth, and fifteenth 
centuries. Her suprem- 
acy on the Mediterra- 
nean Sea, which was as 
complete as is England's on the ocean to-day, was celebrated each 
year by the unique ceremony of "Wedding the Adriatic " by the 
dropping of a ring into the sea. The origin of this custom was as fol- 
lows. In the year 1 1 7 7 Pope Alexander III, out of gratitude to the 
Venetians for services rendered him in his quarrel with the Emperor 
Frederick Barbarossa, gave a ring to the Doge with these words : 
"Take this as a token of dominion over the sea, and wed her 
every year, you and your successors forever, in order that all may 
know that the sea belongs to Venice and is subject to her as a bride 
is subject to her husband." This annual celebration of the cere- 
mony was one of the most brilliant spectacles of the Middle Ages. 
The maritime power and ascendancy of Venice was embodied 
in her famous Arsenal. This consisted of a series of wharves, 




Fig. 32. — State Barge of Venice used 
IN THE Ceremony of "Wedding the 
Adriatic." (From a model preserved in 
the Venetian Arsenal ; after Lacroix) 



VENICE AND GENOA 



l8l 



dockyards, and vast magazines filled with marine war-engines and 
military stores of every kind. In the city's palmiest day sixteen 
thousand shipbuilders, workmen, and guards were employed here. 
The Arsenal was one of the sights of Europe and is still an object 
of interest to the curious traveler. Dante introduced in his 
Inferno^ a celebrated description of the place, doubtless from 
personal knowledge of it. 

The decline of Venice dates from the fifteenth century. The 
conquests of the 

Ottoman Turks r^ . . . <C 

during this century 
deprived her of 
much of the terri- 
tory she held east 
of the Adriatic, 
and finally the dis- 
covery of the New 
World by Colum- 
bus and of an un- 
broken water route 
to India by Vasco 
da Gama gave a 
deathblow to her 
commerce. From 

this time on the trade with the East was to be conducted from 
the Atlantic ports instead of from those in the Mediterranean. 

192. Genoa. — Genoa, on the old Ligurian coast, was after 
Venice the most powerful of the Itahan maritime cities. She early 
crushed her near competitor Pisa,^ and then entered into a fierce 
competition with Venice for the control of the trade of the Orient. 

The period of Genoa's greatest prosperity dates from the 
recapture of Constantinople from the Latins by the Greeks in 

6 Canto xxi, 7-19. 

J" Pisa is located a little to the south of Genoa, on the same coast. The first 
battle between the navies of the two republics was fought in 1070. Thenceforward 
for two centuries the rival cities were engaged in an almost continuous war, which 
finally resulted in the complete destruction of the power of Pisa. 




Fig. -^1. — A Canal in Venice. (From a 
photograph) 



l82 THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

126 1. Through jealousy of the Venetians, the Genoese assisted 
the Greeks in the recovery of Constantinople and in return 
were given various commercial privileges in places along the 
Bosporus. Very soon they established stations upon the shores 
of the Euxine and began to carry on a lucrative trade with 
Eastern Asia by way of the Black Sea and the Caspian. 

The jealousy with which the Venetians regarded the prosperity 
of the Genoese led to oft-renewed war between the two rival 
republics. For nearly two centuries their hostile fleets contended, 
as did the navies of Rome and Carthage, for the supremacy of 
the sea. In the year 1380 Venice inflicted upon her rival a ter- 
rible naval defeat which crippled her permanently. 

The final blow to Genoa's prosperity, however, was given by 
the irruption into Europe of the Mongols and the Ottoman 
Turks, and the capture of Constantinople by the latter in 1453 
(sec. 179). The Genoese traders were now driven from the 
Black Sea, and their traffic with Eastern Asia was completely 
broken up ; for the Venetians had control of the ports of Egypt 
and Syria and the southern routes to India and the countries 
beyond, — that is, the routes by way of the Euphrates and the 
Red Sea. 

193. Florence. — Florence, " the most illustrious and fortunate 
of Italian republics;" although from her inland location upon the 
Arno shut out from engaging in those naval enterprises that con- 
ferred wealth and importance upon the coast cities of Venice, 
Genoa, and Pisa, became, notwithstanding, through the skill, 
industry, enterprise, and genius of her citizens, the great manu- 
facturing, financial, literary, and art center of the later mediae- 
val centuries. The list of her illustrious citizens, of her poets, 
statesmen, historians, architects, sculptors, and painters is more 
extended than that of any other city of mediaeval times; and 
indeed, as respects the number of her great men, Florence is per- 
haps unrivaled by any city of the ancient or modern world save 
Athens. In her long roll of fame we find the names of Dante, 
Petrarch, Boccaccio, Machiavelli, Michael Angelo, Leonardo da 
Vinci, Galileo, Amerigo Vespucci, and the Medici. 




3 
o 

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o 
o 

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O 

a. 

a 



H ^ 

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O § 

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1-1 

Ph 



THEIR SERVICES TO CIVILIZATION 183 

About the beginning of the fifteenth century Florence fell into 
the hands of the celebrated Medici,^ a Florentine family that had 
grown rich and powerful through mercantile enterprises. These 
usurpers of liberty were fortunately, enlightened despots and made 
their rule generally acceptable to the Florentines through a mu- 
nificent patronage extended to artists and scholars, an unstinted 
liberality in the prosecution of magnificent public works, and the 
glory they shed upon Florence by the maintenance of a brilHant 
court. 

194. Services to Civilization of the Mediaeval Towns. — Modern 
civiHzation inherited much from each of the three great centers 
of mediaeval life, — the monastery, the castle, and the town. We 
have noticed what came out of cloister and of baronial hall, \vhat 
the monk and what the baron contributed to civilization.^ We 
must now see what came out of the town, what contribution 
the burgher made to European life and culture. 

In the first place, the mediaeval cities bequeathed to modem 
times certain valuable economic ideals and principles. It was in 
the heart of these communities, as within the early Benedictine 
monasteries, that labor, almost for the first time in history, if we 
except the teachings and practices of the Hebrews, was emanci- 
pated and the stigma put upon it by slavery and serfdom 
removed.^^ In the cities of ancient Greece and Italy, speaking 
generally, trading, save in a large way, and all manual employ- 
ments were given over into servile hands; a citizen engaging in 
business was in some cases punished by being deprived of his 
citizenship, since he was regarded as having dishonored himself, 
or, in the words of Plato, as having " thrown dirt on his father's 
house." ^^ In the mediaeval towns, on the contrary, it was a very 

8 The two most distinguished names of the house are those of Cosimo de' Medici 
(i 389-1464), who was called the "Friend of the People and the Father of his Coun- 
try," and Lorenzo, his grandson (1448-1492), who had bestowed upon him the title 
of " The Magnificent." 9 See sees. 32 and loi. 

10 Serfdom was early extinguished in the towns, which became one of the most 
powerful agencies, both through direct action and indirect influence, in the abolition 
of rural serfdom. 

11 " He who in any way shares in the ilUberality of retail trades may be indicted by 
any one who likes for dishonoring his race, before those who are judged to be first in 



i84 



THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 



general rule that only the members of the merchant and craft 
gilds could have lot and part in the municipal government. 
This meant that here labor had ceased to be servile and was 
coming to be looked upon, at least by the laborers themselves, 
as honorable. This new feeling regarding labor the towns 




Fig. 34. — The Cologne Cathedral. (From a photograph) 

This edifice was begun in the eleventh century, but was not finished until our 
own day (1880). It is one of the most imposing monuments of Gothic archi- 
tecture in the world 



transmitted to the Modem Age. This was one of the most 
precious elements of their great bequest. 

In the second place, the towns were the cradle of modern com- 
merce, that is of trade on a large scale between widely separated 
cities and lands. It was through the activity and enterprise of 

virtue ; and if he appear to throw dirt upon his father's house by an unworthy occu- 
pation, let him be imprisoned for a year and abstain from that sort of thing." — 
Laws J xi. 919 (Jowett's trans.). So also Aristotle. Speaking of the state which is best 
governed, he says : " The citizens . . . must not lead the life of mechanics or trades- 
men, for such life is ignoble and inimical to virtue." — Politics, vii. 9 (Jowett's trans.). 



THEIR SERVICES TO CIVILIZATION 



185 



the mediaeval merchant and trader that was laid the basis of that 
vast system of international exchange and traffic which forms so 
characteristic a feature of modern European civilization. 

In the third place, the mediaeval cities, along with the monas- 
teries, were the foster home of architecture, sculpture, and paint- 
ing. These things, as has been well said, are " the beautiful 
flowers of free city life." The old picturesque 
high-gabled houses, the sculptured gild halls, 
the artistic gateways, the superb palaces, and 
the imposing cathedrals found in so many 
of the cities of Eu- 
rope to-day bear wit- 
ness to the important 
place which the 
mediaeval towns hold 
in the history of 
architecture and art.-^^ 

In the fourth place, 
the towns were the 
birthplace of modem 
political liberty. 
They became such 
through giving so- 
ciety a new order at 
a time when political 
society was made up 
of orders. In the 
eleventh and twelfth 
centuries there were 
only two classes, or 
orders, in the state which had participation in the government, 
— the nobility and the clergy. The inhabitants of the towns 

12 The enthusiasm for church building was most marked in the twelfth and thir- 
teenth centuries. The style of architecture first employed was the Romanesque, 
characterized by the rounded arch and the dome; but towards the close of the 
twelfth century this was superseded by the Gothic, distinguished by the pointed 
arch, the slender spire, and rich ornamentation. 




Fig. 35. — Town Hall of Louvain 

(After Lubke) 

This magnificent Gothic edifice dates from the 

fifteenth century 



l86 THE GROWTH OF THE TOWNS 

grew into a new order destined to a great political future, the 
so-called Third Estate, or Commons}^ During the course of 
the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the representatives of 
the towns came to sit along with the nobles and the clergy in the 
national diets or parliaments of the different countries.^* What 
this meant for the development of modern parliamentary govern- 
ment we shall learn later. 

In the fifth place, it was the most typical of the free cities, 
those of Italy, which gave to the world the Renaissance, that 
great essentially intellectual movement which marked the latter 
part of the Middle Ages. The relation of the Italian cities to this 
mental awakening will be made the subject of a section further on 
(sec. 279). 

Selections from the Sources. — Lee, Source-Book, § 56, " Charter of 
the City of London (from Henry I)." Colby, Selections, p. 70, " A Town 
Charter." Translations and Reprints, vol. ii, No. i, "English Towns and 
Gilds " (ed. by Edward P. Cheyney). European History Studies (Univ. of 
Nebraska), vol. ii, Nos. 8 and 9, " The Rise of Cities " and " The Trades of 
Paris." Robinson, Readings in European History, vol. i, chap, xviii (in part). 

Secondary "Works. — Guizot, Histoiy of Civilization in Europe, Lect. 
vii, *' Rise of the Free Cities." Green, Town Life in the Fifteenth Ceji- 
tury. Gross, The Gild Merchant. The best authority on the subject it 
covers. Zimmern, The Hansa Towns. Symonds, Age of the Despots, 
chaps, iii and iv. Hazlitt, The Venetian Reptiblic. . The standard 
authority in English, Weil, Venice, chaps, i-xii. Duffy, The Tuscari 
Repicblics {Florence, Siena, Pisa, and Lucca) with Genoa. Emerton, 
MedicEval Europe, chap, xv (last part). Adams, Civilization during the 
Middle Ages, chap, xii, "The Growth of Commerce and its Results." 
Cheyney, An Lntroduction to the Industrial and Social History of Eng- 
land, chaps, iii and iv. Munro and Sellery, Mediceval Civilization, 
pp. 358-365. Mrs. Oliphant, Makers of Venice. In the " Mediaeval 
Towns" series there are separate volumes on Florence, Nuremberg, 
Bruges, etc., which contain chapters of interest. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Gilds. 2. Frederick Barbarossa 
and Milan. 3. ^\i& carroccio. 4. A typical Italian despot. See Symond's 
Age of the Despots. 5. The Wedding of the Adriatic. 6. The Venetian 
Arsenal. 7. St. Mark's at Venice. 8. Cathedral building. 

13 In England the men of the rural districts, that is of the counties, formed from 
the first, or almost from the first, a part of this order. In other countries, however, 
it was not until a later time that the rural class came to reenforce the new estate. 

1^ See sees. 211 and 236. 



CHAPTER XVI 
THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

1.95. Introductory. — "History's true object of study," says 
Fustel de Coulanges, "is the human mind; it should aspire to 
know what this mind has beUeved, thought, and felt in the dif- 
ferent ages of the life of the human race." 

What we have narrated in preceding chapters respecting medi- 
aeval institutions and enterprises will have revealed to the 
thoughtful reader something at least of both the mind and the 
heart of the men of the Middle Ages. Nothing, however, mirrors 
more perfectly the purely intellectual life of those centuries than 
the universities which the age-spirit called into existence. For 
this reason we propose in the present chapter to say something 
of these institutions and of what was taught in them. 

196. The Rise and Early Growth of the Universities. — It will 
be recalled that a significant feature of the work of Charlemagne 
was the establishment of schools in connection with the cathe- 
drals and monasteries of his realm (sec. 76). From the opening 
of the ninth till well on into the eleventh century the lamp of 
learning was fed in these episcopal and monastic schools, 
although throughout the tenth century the flame burned very 
low. Closely associated with these Church seminaries we find the 
names of many of the most influential men of the earUer 
mediaeval centuries. 

But towards the close of the eleventh and the opening of the 
twelfth century a new intellectual movement, which was destined 
to affect profoundly these schools, began to stir Western Christen- 
dom. This mental revival was caused by many agencies, particu- 
larly by the quickening influence of the Graeco-Arabian culture in 
Spain and the Orient, with which the Christian West was just 
now being brought into closer contact through the Crusades. 

187 



l88 THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

As a consequence of this newly awakened intellectual life there 
arose a demand for more advanced and specialized instruction 
than that given in the cloister schools, and especially for a freer 
and more secular system of education, one that should prepare a 
person for entering upon a professional career as a physician, 
lawyer, or statesman.^ 

It was in response to these new demands that the universities 
came into existence. Their early history is very obscure for the 
reason that the most ancient ones, as Laurie says," grew and were 
not founded." Some of these were mere expansions of cathedral or 
monastery schools ; others developed out of lay schools which 
had grown up in commercial towns, especially in the Italian 
cities, and in which the instruction given was almost wholly 
secular in character and practical in aim. 

The popes patronized the rising schools, " believing that all 
learning tended to the glory of God and the good of the 
Church"; emperors and kings granted them charters confirm- 
ing their already acquired privileges, or granting them fresh 
immunities, in the expectation that they would prove a bulwark 
of the imperial or royal authority ; cities fostered their growth for 
the sake of the distinction they conferred and the residents and 
trade they attracted. 

It was about the end of the twelfth and the opening of the 
thirteenth century when the earliest universities were formally 
recognized by royal and papal charters. Three of the most ancient 
universities were the University of Salerno, noted for its teachers 
in medicine ; the University of Bologna, frequented for its instruc- 
tion in law ; and the University of Paris, revered for the authority 
of its doctors in theology. Bologna and Paris served as models 
in organization and government for the most of the later univer- 
sities. The University of Paris gave constitution and rules to so 

1 The number of faculties in the mediaeval university was not fixed. A usual 
number was four, — the Faculty of Theology, the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty 
of Law, and the Faculty of Arts (or Philosophy). The course in arts embraced what 
is to-day covered by the courses in letters and science, and served as a preparation 
for entrance upon one of the three specialized professional courses, though most of 
the students never went beyond it. 



UNIVERSITY ORGANIZATION 189 

many as to earn the designation of " the Mother of Universities 
and the Sinai of the Middle Ages." 

197. University Organization : the " Nations," or Gilds. — 
Many features of the mediaeval university can be understood 
only in the light of the fact that in the mediaeval town the alien 
was almost as wholly without rights, both political and civil, as 
was the aUen in a city of ancient Greece, and that in case of most 
of the universities, not only the students, but the masters as well, 
were almost all noncitizens of the towns in which they gathered. 
Consequently, for the sake of comradeship, for mutual assistance 
and " the avenging of injuries," the students, either alone or in 
connection with their teachers, organized themselves, according 
to the countries whence they came, into associations or gilds, 
which came to be known as " Nations." At Paris there were four 
of these groups, at Bologna thirty-six. 

It was these gilds which exercised or enjoyed the special rights 
and privileges to which we referred in the preceding paragraph. 
These privileges very generally included exemption from taxation, 
from mihtary service, and freedom from the jurisdiction of the 
ordinary courts. The early universities thus became in a large 
measure self-governed and self-judged communities, in a word, 
"literary republics," holding some such relation to the civil 
authorities of the cities in which they were situated as many 
of these cities themselves, in the age of independent city life, 
held to the state. 

198. Students and Student Life. — The number of students in 
attendance at the mediaeval universities was large. Contempo- 
raries tell of crowds of fifteen, twenty, and even thirty thousand 
at the most popular institutions. These numbers have been called 
in question, and it will be safe to consider them, like other med- 
iaeval figures, merely as "metaphors for immensity." But that 
the attendance was numerous is certain, for in those times all 
who were eager to acquire knowledge — and the intellectual 
ferment was general — must needs seek some seat of learning, 
since the scarcity and great cost of manuscript books put home 
study out of the question. Then, again, many of the pupils 



I90 THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

attending the nonprofessional courses were mere boys of twelve 
or thereabouts, — the high-school pupils of to-day ; while, on the 
other hand, the student body embraced many mature men, among 
whom were to be counted canons, deans, archdeacons, and other 
dignitaries. 

Student life in the earlier university period, before the dormi- 
tory and college system was introduced, was unregulated and 
shamefully disorderly. The age was rough and lawless, and the 




Fig. ^6. — University Audience in the Fifteenth Century 
(From Geiger's Renaissance and Humanismus) 

student class were no better than their age; indeed, in some 
respects they seem to have been worse. For the student body 
included many rich young profligates, who found the universities 
the most agreeable places for idling away their time, as well as 
many wild and reckless characters who were constantly engaging 
in tavern brawls, terrorizing the townsmen at night, even waylay- 
ing travelers on the public roads, and committing " many other 
enormities hateful to God." 



METHODS OF INSTRUCTION 191 

Between the students composing the different " Nations " there 
existed much race prejudice and animosity, which sometimes 
broke out in unseemly riots in the lecture room. The most 
serious feuds, however, arose between the students and the towns- 
men. " Town and gown " disagreements and fights were common 
and not unfrequently resulted in the migration to another city of 
the whole, or practically the whole, body of students and masters. 

199. Branches of Study and Methods of Instruction. — The ad- 
vanced studies given greatest prominence in the universities were 
the three professional branches of theology, medicine, and law. 
The natural sciences can hardly be said to have existed, although 
in alchemy lay hidden the germ of chemistry and in astrology that 
of astronomy. The Ptolemaic theory, which made the earth the 
stationary center of the revolving celestial spheres, gave color and 
form to all conceptions of the structure of the universe. 

The method of instruction in all the university departments 
was the same. It was a servile study of texts, which were regarded 
with a veneration bordering on superstition and were minutely 
analyzed and commented upon. Thus in theology it was a study 
of the Bible and particularly of the writings of the Church Fathers 
and doctors ; in medicine, an explanation of the works of Hippoc- 
rates and Galen with their Arabian commentators; in natural 
science, a study of the physics of Aristotle ; in civil law, a com- 
mentary on the works of the Corpus Juris of Justinian, and in 
canon law, on the decisions and edicts of popes and councils. 
Not even in the physical sciences was there any serious appeal to 
experience, to observation, to experiment. In anatomy, discus- 
sions took the place of dissections.^ Books were considered better 
authority than nature herself. "Aristotle," says Ueberweg, "was 
regarded as the founders of religions are wont to be considered." 
One venturing to criticise this " Master of those who know " was 
looked upon as presumptuous and irreverent. 

This mode of study resulted in part from an imitation of 
the method followed in theology, which was perforce a study of 

2 At Bologna, where anatomical study was most advanced, each student witnessed 
only one dissection during the year. 



192 THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

texts held as authoritative or infallible ; and in part from the lack 
of books, which made dictation by the teacher and note taking 
and memorizing by the student the only practicable mode of 
c^-rrying on the work of the lecture room. 

The ordinary classes met in private rooms or hired apartments. 
Mass meetings of the *' Nations " and other large assemblages 
were held in some convenient cathedral or convent church bor- 
rowed for the occasion. The university itseK had at first neither 
dormitories nor halls.^ 

200. Scholasticism ; the Province of the Schoolmen. — Springmg 
up within the early ecclesiastical schools and developed within the 
later universities, there came into existence a method of philoso- 
phizing which, from the place of its origin, was called Scho- 
lasticism, while its representatives were called Schoolmen, or 
Scholastics. 

The chief task of the Schoolmen was the reducing of Christian 
doctrines to scientific form, the harmonizing of revelation and 
reason, of faith and science. They thought it possible to build up 
a science of theology which, like the science of geometry, should 
consist of indisputable theorems and corollaries resting upon a 
foundation of axioms and exact definitions. Their aim was to give 
every Christian doctrine a demonstration so complete and absolute 
as to compel the behef of everybody, — skeptics, pagans, and 
Saracens. 

We should note that the typical Schoolmen did not question 
the truth or soundness of the doctrines and teachings of the 
Church. They did not ask. Are these things so? but simply. 
How and why 2s& they so? Surely there must be a reason for 
everything, they insisted, and God has given us our reasoning 
faculty that we might search out reasons and causes. 

201. The Earlier Schoolmen ; Abelard. — John Scotus Erigena, 
an Irish teacher and philosopher, is sometimes called the first of 

3 It was this poverty of the university which rendered so easy those migrations 
or secessions of dissatisfied students and masters of which we hear so frequently. 
Nothing prevented them, if they felt themselves wronged by the local authorities, 
from fleeing from one city to another. Several of the younger universities originated 
in such movements. 



THE EARLIER SCHOOLMEN 193 

the Schoolmen; but more generally this place is given to St. 
Anselm (i 033-1 109), abbot of the monastery of Bee in Normandy 
and later Archbishop of Canterbury in England.* The maxim of 
this typical Schoolman was : " I beUeve in order that I may 
understand." 

But by far the most eminent of the early Schoolmen was Peter 
Abelard (1079-1142). Such a teacher the world had probably 
not produced since Socrates enchained the youth of Athens. 
At Paris over five thousand pupils are said to have thronged his 
lecture room. Driven by the shame of a public scandal and by 
persecution to seek retirement, he hid himself first in a monas- 
tery and later in a solitude near the city of Troyes. But his 
admirers followed him into the wilds in such multitudes that a 
veritable university sprang up around him in his desert retreat. 

Abelard carried to an extreme the tendency of the Schoolmen 
to rationaHze everything. " A doctrine is believed," he taught, 
" not because God has said it, but because we are convinced by 
reason that it is so." He declared doubt to be the starting point 
in the quest of knowledge, and, apparently with the object of 
producing this desirable state of mind in his disciples, wrote a 
. book entitled Sic et Non ('' So and Not So "), which was a col- 
lection of mutually contradictory opinions of the Church Fathers 
on every conceivable theological question. 

The Church conservatives became frightened. Bernard of 
Clairvaux, preacher of the Second Crusade, entered the lists 
against the presumptuous champion of the human reason. Ber- 
nard's principle was that man acquires a knowledge of divine things 
_ by way of the heart and not by way of the intellect. " God is 
known," he finely said, "in proportion as he is loved." He 
charged Abelard with pride of intellect : " There is nothing in 
heaven or on earth," he said, " that he does not claim to know." 
He complained that no place was left for faith; the human 
reason usurped everything. 

4 With St. Anselm begins practically the great Scholastic controversy of the 
Nominalists and Realists which never wholly ceased in the mediaeval schools. For 
an account of this prolonged discussion the student must have recourse to works 
on philosophy. 



194 THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

The temper of the times was against Abelard. Certain of his 
opinions were condemned by two Church councils, and he was 
forced to burn part of his writings. This was one of the most 
noteworthy colHsions between ecclesiastical authority and freedom 
of thought during the Middle Ages. 

Abelard 's brilliant reputation as a philosopher was tarnished 
by grave faults of character. Intrusted with the education of a 
fascinating and mentally gifted maiden, Heloise by name, Abelard 
betrayed the confidence reposed in him. A secret marriage 
bound in a tragic fate the lives of teacher and pupil. The "tale 
of Abelard and Heloise" forms one of the most romantic yet 
saddest traditions of the twelfth century. 

202. Scholasticism in the Thirteenth Century ; Albert the Great 
and Thomas Aquinas. — The thirteenth century witnessed a fresh 
development of Scholasticism. The impulse to this renewed 
intellectual activity came to the Christian West, like many simi- 
lar incitements, from ancient Greece. It came at this time 
through various channels, but mainly through the Arabian schools 
in Spain. 

•Before the end of the first quarter of the thirteenth century 
all the works of Aristotle were for the first time brought to the 
knowledge of the Schoolmen. Before this it was chiefly his logic 
which was known to them; but now all his other works were 
translated into Latin, at first from Arabic or Hebrew versions, 
and then later directly from the Greek text. 

It would be difficult to exaggerate the stimulating influence of 
these fresh philosophical and scientific acquisitions upon the 
Christian thinkers of the West. The great age of Scholasticism 
now opened. The universities of Paris and Oxford were the chief 
centers of the new movement ; the Mendicant Orders furnished 
its most illustrious representatives. 

From the Dominican Order came Albertus Magnus, or " Albert 
the Great" (i 193-1280), who was called " the second Aristotle," 
and Thomas Aquinas (1225 or 1227-1274), known as "the 
Angelic Doctor." As philosophers these Schoolmen stand to 
each other in some such relation as did Plato and Aristotle, nor 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE OF SCHOLASTICISM 195 

are their names unworthy of being linked with the names of those 
great thinkers of ancient Greece. The reputation of Aquinas as 
the greatest Scholastic and theologian of the Middle Ages rests 
largely upon his prodigious work . entitled Summa Theologies, or 
" Sum of Theology." ^ The work is regarded as the standard of 
orthodoxy in the Catholic Church. 

From the Franciscan Order came Duns Scotus (d. 1308), a 
British monk, whose keen analytical intellect caused him to be 
called " the Subtle Doctor." '' The mind of Duns Scotus," says 
Dean Milman, "might seem a wonderful reasoning machine; 
whatever was thrown into it came out in syllogisms." 

203. The Scientific Side of Scholasticism ; Roger Bacon. — The 
typical Schoolman was a logician, and speculative subjects con- 
nected with theology were his supreme interest; yet there were 
some Schoolmen who devoted themselves largely to physical 
science, and sought to gain a knowledge of nature, not alone 
through books, but by direct personal observation and study of 
nature herself. The impulse to this study of the natural sciences 
was communicated to Christian scholars mainly through their 
contact with Greek and Arabian learning. 

The most noteworthy representative of the scientific activity of 
the Scholastic age was the English Franciscan friar, Roger Bacon 
(d. 1294), called "the Wonderful Doctor," on account of his 
marvelous knowledge of mechanics, optics, chemistry, and other 
sciences. He understood the composition of gunpowder, or a 
similar explosive, and seemingly the nature of steam ; for in one 
of his works he says that " wagons and ships could be built which 
would propel themselves with the swiftness of an arrow, without 
horses and without sails." His contemporaries believed him to 
be in league with the devil. He suffered persecution and was 
imprisoned for fourteen years. 

5 This was not the first attempt of the kind. In the twelfth century Peter of 
Lombard (d. 1 164) wrote his famous Four Books of Sentences, which earned for him 
the title of " the Master of Sentences." This work, which served in some sort as a 
basis for the Summa by Aquinas, consisted mainly of a collection of short quota- 
tions from the writings of the Church Fathers and doctors. It was one of the most 
popular text-books ever written. It held its place in the schools as a manual of 
theology for more than three hundred years. 



196 THE UNIVERSITIES AND THE SCHOOLMEN 

Roger Bacon's greatest bequest to posterity was a book called 
Opus Majus, in which is anticipated in a wonderful way those 
principles of modern inductive science laid down by Francis 
Bacon in the seventeenth century. "The advance of sound his- 
torical judgment," says Andrew D. White, *' seems likely to bring 
the fame of the two who bear the name of Bacon nearly to 
equality." 

204. The Last of the Schoolmen. — The fourteenth and fif- 
teenth centuries witnessed the decline of Scholasticism. Scholas- 
tic debate in the hands of unworthy successors of the great 
philosophers of the thirteenth century fell away for the most 
part into barren disputations over idle and impossible questions. 
The representatives of this degenerate Scholasticism became the 
objects of the unmeasured scorn and ridicule of the men of the 
New Learning brought in by that revival of classical culture 
which marked the later mediaeval age. The low estimation in 
which the Schoolmen of this period came to be held is disclosed 
in the history of our word dunce. Originally applied as an 
appellation of honor to a disciple of the great Duns or to any 
learned person, the term at this time, being ironically applied to 
the stupid Scholastic opposed to classical studies, came to acquire 
its present meaning of a preposterous dolt. 

205. The Services of the Schoolmen to Intellectual Progress. — 
The Schoolmen fill a large place in the history of the intellectual 
development, of the race. They rendered in this relation two 
distinct and important services. 

In the first place, by their ceaseless debates and argumenta- 
tion they stimulated to activity the mediaeval intellect and dis- 
ciplined it in the processes of exact reasoning. They made 
the universities of the time real inental gymnasia in which the 
European mind was trained and prepared for its later and, 
happily, more fruitful work. 

In the second place, the Schoolmen rendered a great serv- 
ice to the cause of intellectual freedom. This assertion at first 
blush may appear paradoxical, when one recalls that the submis- 
sion of reason to Church authority was one of the fundamental 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 197 

maxims of the orthodox Schoolmen. But the place they gave 
the human reason and the constant appeal they made to it was 
preparing the way for the full and plain assertion of the principle 
of the freedom of thought. " Scholasticism as a whole," says 
Professor Seth, "may be justly regarded as the history of the 
growth and gradual emancipation of reason which was completed 
in the movements of the Renaissance and the Reformation." 



Selections from the Sources. — Translations and Reprints, vol. ii, No. 3, 
« The Mediaeval Student " (ed. by Dana Carleton Munro). Henderson, 
Select Historical Documents, pp. 262-266, " The Foundation of the Uni- 
versity of Heidelberg, a.d. 1386." Dante, Divina Commedia (trans, by 
Longfellow). There is much of the spirit, the form, and the substance of 
Scholasticism in this great mediaeval poem, for, after Aristotle, the School- 
men Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas were Dante's masters in 
philosophy and science. An admirable bit of Scholastic reasoning and 
exposition will be found in canto vii of the Faradiso, where Beatrice dis- 
courses on " the Incarnation, the Immortality of the soul, and the Resur- 
rection of the body." 

Secondary Works. — Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the 
Middle Ages. Laurie, The Rise and Early Constitution of Universities. 
CoMPAYRE, A be lard, and the Origin and Early History of Universities. 
Jessopp, The Coming of the Friars, chap, vi, " The Building up of a Uni- 
versity." Church, Saint Anselm. Alzog, Universal Church History, 
vol. ii, pp. 728-784. Fisher, History of the Christian Church, pp. 208- 
226. Stille, Studies in Mediceval History, chap. xiii. Emerton, Mediaval 
Europe, chap. xiii. Morison, The Life and Times of Saint Bernard, and 
Storrs, Bernard of Clairvaux. In each of these works will be found an 
interesting account of Bernard's controversy with Abelard. Gallienne, 
Old Love Stories Retold, " Abelard and Heloise." Mullinger, A History of 
the University of Cambridge, chaps, i-iii. Munro and Sellery, Mediceval 
Civilization, pp. 348-357. Consult also articles on " Universities " and 
" Scholasticism" in the Encyc. Brit. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The "Nations" at the universities. 
2. Student life. 3. " Town and gown." 4. Abelard and St. Bernard. 
5. Albertus Magnus. 6. Thomas Aquinas. 7. Roger Bacon. 



CHAPTER XVII 

GROWTH OF THE NATIONS : FORMATION OF NATIONAL 
GOVERNMENTS AND LITERATURES 

206. Introductory. — The most important political movement, 
that marked the latter part of the Middle Ages was the fusion, 
in several of the countries of Europe, of the petty feudal prin- 
cipaHties and half-independent cities and communes into great 
nations with strong centrahzed governments. This movement was 
accompanied by, or rather consisted in, the decline of feudalism 
as a governmental system, the loss by the cities of their freedom, 
and the growth of the power of the kings. 

Many things contributed to this consolidation of peoples and 
governments, different circumstances favoring the movement 
in the different countries. In some countries, however, condi- 
tions were opposed to the centraHzing tendency, and in these 
the Modern Age was reached without nationality having been 
found. But in England, in France, and in Spain circumstances 
all seemed to tend towards unity, and by the close of the fif- 
teenth century there were established in these countries strong 
despotic monarchies. Yet even among those peoples where 
national governments did not appear, some progress was made 
towards unity through the formation of national languages and 
literatures, and the development of common feehngs and aspira- 
tions, so that these races or peoples were manifestly only await- 
ing the opportunities of a happier period for the maturing of 
their national life. 

This rise of monarchy and decline of feudalism, this substitu- 
tion of strong centralized governments in place of the feeble, 
irregular, and conflicting rule of the feudal nobles or of other local 
authorities was a very great gain to the cause of law and good 
order. It paved the way for modern progress and civilization. 

198 



ENGLAND jgg 

In these changes the political liberties of all classes, of the 
cities as well as of the nobility, were, it is true, subverted. But 
though Liberty was lost, Nationahty was found. And the people 
may be trusted to win back freedom, as we shall see. Those 
sturdy burghers — the merchants, artisans, lawyers of the cities 
— who, in the eleventh century, showed themselves stronger 
than lords, will in time, with the help of the yeomanry, prove 
themselves stronger than h'ngs. Europe shall be not only orderly, 
but free. Out of despotic monarchy will rise constitutional, 
representative government. 



I. England 

207. General Statement. — In earlier chapters we told of the 
origin of the English people and traced their growth under 
Saxon, Danish, and ^^ Norman rulers. In the present section we 
shall tell very briefly the story of their fortunes under the Plan- 
tagenet^ house and its branches, thus carrying on our narrative 
to the accession of the Tudors in 1485, from which event dates 
the beginning of the modern history of England. 

The chief events of the period which we shall notice were the 
martyrdom of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, the 
loss of the English possessions in France, the wresting of Magna 
Carta from King John, the formation of the House of Commons, 
the conquest of Wales, the wars with Scotland, the Hundred 
Years' War with France, and the Wars of the Roses. 

1 The name Plantagenet Ccime from ' the peculiar badge, a sprig of broom plant 
{flante de gen^t), adopted by one of the early members of the house. Following is 
a table of the sovereigns of the family. 



HOUSE OF LANCASTER 



Henry 11 1154-1189 

Richard I 1189-1199 Henry IV 1399-1413 

John ♦. 1199-1216 Henry V 1413-1422 

Henry HI 1216-1272 Henry VI 1422-1461 

Edward I 1272-1307 house of york 

Edward II 1307-1327 Edward IV 1461-1483 

Edward III .... . 1327-1377 Edward V 1483 

Richard II i377-i399 Richard III 1483-1485 



200 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

208. The Martyrdom of Thomas Becket (11 7 2). — The most 
impressive event in the reign of the first Plantagenet was a 
tragedy, — the murder of Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of 
Canterbury. This event possesses great historical interest for the 
reason that it grew out of those contentions between the civil 
and ecclesiastical authorities which, as we have seen, make up 
a large part of mediaeval history. 

The circumstances leading up to the tragedy were these. In 
the early years of Henry's reign Thomas had been a favorite 
courtier, and chancellor of the realm. Thinking that he would 
serve him well as primate, Henry made hini Archbishop of Can- 
terbury. As archbishop, Thomas came into conflict with the 
king on several matters involving the relations of the clergy to 
the civil power, the most important of which was a question 
regarding the trial of clerks by the secular courts. At this time 
in England the clergy were exempt from the jurisdiction of the 
ordinary courts of justice.^ Since the Church courts could inflict 
no severer penalty than imprisonment, it often happened that 
clerks guilty of the most heinous crimes, even of murder, were 
punished inadequately, or even not at all. Moreover, the judges 
of these courts were said to be over-lenient in deahng with 
accused members of their own order. 

Henry resolved that the clergy, like laymen, should be subject 
to the civil courts. To this end he caused to be drawn up the 
so-called Constitutions of Clarendon (i 164), a collection of " sl cer- 
tain part of the customs, liberties, and dignities of his ancestors," 
which among other things provided that persons in orders accused 
of crime should be tried by the king's judges, if these judges deemed 
the cases to be such as should come before them, and that no case 
should be appealed from the courts of the archbishops to the Pope 
without the king's consent. 

2 Charlemagne had recognized the principle, held from early times by the Church, 
that ecclesiastics should be amenable only to the ecclesiastical tribunals, by freeing 
the whole body of the clergy from the jurisdiction of the temporal courts, in criminal 
as well as in civil cases. Gradually the bishops acquired the right to try all cases 
relating to marriage, trusts, perjury, simony, or concerning widows, orphans, or 
crusaders, on the ground that such cases had to do with religion. 




o 

c 

d 

S 

o 



MARTYRDOM OF THOMAS BECKET 



20I 



Thomas, after some hesitation, swore to observe the Consti- 
tutions, but soon he repented having done so, and sought and 
obtained from the Pope release from his oath. He maintained 
that the ordinances took away from the Church undoubted rights 
and privileges. His course led to a long and violent quarrel with 
the king. Finally, Henry dropped an impatient expression, which 
four of his courtier knights interpreted as a wish that Thomas 
should be put out of the way. These 
men sought out the archbishop in the 
cathedral at Canterbury and murdered 
him on the steps of the altar. 

The people ever regarded Thomas 
as a martyr and his tomb in the cathe- 
dral became a place of pilgrimage. 
Three hundred years later the poet 
Chaucer made the journey thither 
of a goodly company of pilgrims the 
groundwork of his celebrated Can- 
terbury Tales (sec. 228). 

The attitude of the people after the 
murder of Thomas compelled Henry 
to give up the idea of enforcing the 
provisions of the Constitutions of Clar- 
endon. Moreover, he was constrained 
to do penance for his participation in the crime by submitting to 
a flogging by the monks of Canterbury at the martyr's tomb. 

209. Loss of the English Possessions in France (i 202-1 204). 
— The issue of the battle of Hastings, in 1066, made William of 
Normandy king of England. But we must bear in mind that he 
still held his possessions in France as a fief from the French king, 
whose vassal he was. These Continental lands, save for some short 
intervals, remained under the rule of Wilham's Norman successors 
in England. Then, when Henry, Count of Anjou, came to the 
English throne as the first of the Plantagenets, these territories 
were greatly increased by the French possessions of that prince. 
The larger part of Henry's dominions, indeed, was in France, the 




Fig. 37. — The Murder of 
Thomas Becket. (From 
a Canterbury seal of 'the 
fourteenth century) 



202 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

whole of the western half of the country being in his hands ; but 
for all of this he of course paid homage to the French king. 

As was inevitable, a feeling of intense jealousy sprang up between 
the two sovereigns. The French king was ever watching for some 
pretext upon which he might deprive his rival of his possessions 
in France. The opportunity came when John, in 1 199, succeeded 
Richard the Lion-hearted as king of England. Twice that odious 
tyrant was summoned by Philip Augustus of France to appear 
before his French peers and clear himself of certain charges, one 
of which was the murder of his nephew Arthur. John refused to 
obey the summons. Philip was finally able, so strong was the 
feeling against John, to dispossess him of all his lands in France, 
save a part of Aquitaine in the south. 

The loss of these lands was a great gain to England. The 
Angevin kings had been pursuing a policy which, had it been 
successful, would have made England a subordinate part of a 
great continental state. That danger was now averted. In the 
words of Freeman, " England had been a dependency of Anjou ; 
Aquitaine was now a dependency of England." 

210. Magna Carta (12 15). — Magna Carta ^ the " Great Char- 
ter," held sacred as the safeguard of EngHsh liberties, was an 
instrument which the English barons and clergy wrested from 
King John, and in which the ancient rights and privileges of the 
people were clearly defined and guaranteed. 

The circumstances which led up to this memorable transaction, 
narrated in the briefest way possible, were as follows. Among the 
kings of foreign race whom the Norman Conquest brought into 
England there were those who disregarded the customs and insti- 
tutions of the realm and ruled in a very arbitrary and despotic 
manner. King John, as will easily be believed from the revelation 
of his character already made, surpassed the worst of his prede- 
cessors in tyranny and wickedness. His course led to an open 
revolt of the barons of the realm. The tyrant was forced to bow 
to the storm he had raised. He met his barons at Runnymede, a 
flat meadow on the Thames, near Windsor, and there affixed his 
seal to the instrument that had been prepared to receive it. 




SAY 



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OF 



B ISbA Y 



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Angers o\ \ ( ^ 's/' Blois, 
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Fontevraultf:^ O '' 






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THE MfN. WORKS. g_ 



THE GREAT CHARTER 203 

Among the important articles of the Great Charter were the 
following, which we give as showing at once the nature of the 
venerable document and the kind of grievances of which the peo- 
ple had occasion to complain. 

Art. 12. " No scutage^ or aid shall be imposed in our kingdom 
except by the common council of our kingdom, except for the ran- 
soming of our body, for the making of our oldest son a knight, and 
for once marrying our oldest daughter, and for these purposes it shall 
be only a reasonable aid ; ^ . . . 

Art. 39. " No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispos- 
sessed, or outlawed, or banished, or in any way destroyed, nor will we 
go upon him, nor send upon him, except by the legal judgment of his 
peers or by the law of the land. 

Art. 40. " To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny, or delay 
right or justice." 

The Great Charter did not create new rights and privileges, 
but in its main points simply reasserted and confirmed old usages 
and laws. It was immediately violated by John and afterwards 
was disregarded by many of his successors ; but the people always 
clung to it as the warrant and safeguard of their hberties, and 
again and again forced tyrannical kings to renew and confirm its 
provisions, and swear solemnly to observe all its articles. 

Considering the far-reaching consequences that resulted from 
the granting of Magna Carta, — the securing of constitutional 
liberty as an inheritance for the English-speaking race in all parts 
of the world, — it must always be considered the most important 
concession that a freedom- loving people ever wrung from a tyran- 
nical sovereign. 

211. Beginnings of the House of Commons (1265). — The reign 
of Henry III (1216-1272), John's son and successor, witnessed 
the second important step taken in English constitutional free- 
dom. This was the formation of the House of Commons, the 

8 Scutage was a money payment made in commutation of personal military service. 

4 This article respecting taxation was suffered to fall into abeyance in the reign of 
John's successor, Henry III, and it was not until about one hundred years after the 
granting of Magna Carta that the great principle that the people should be taxed 
only through their representatives in Parliament became fully established. 



204 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

Great Council having up to this time been made up of nobles 
and bishops. It was again the royal misbehavior — so frequently 
is it, as Lieber says, that Liberty is indebted to bad kings, though 
to them she owes no thanks — that led to this great change in 
the form of the English national assembly. 

Henry had violated his oath to observe the provisions of the 
Great Charter and had become even more tyrannical than his 
father. In the words of a contemporary, the Enghsh were 
oppressed "hke as the people of Israel under Pharaoh." The 
final outcome was an uprising of the barons and the people sim- 
ilar to that in the reign of King John. The leader of the revolt 
was Earl Simon, a son of the Simon de Montfort who led the first 
crusade against the Albigenses. It was open war between the 
king and his people. In a great engagement known as the battle 
of Lewes (1264), the royal forces were defeated and Henry was 
taken prisoner. 

In order to rally all classes to the support of the cause he 
represented, Earl Simon now issued, in the king's name, writs of 
summons to the barons (save the king's adherents), the bishops, 
and the abbots to meet in Parliament; and at the same time 
sent similar writs to the sheriffs of the different shires, directing 
them " to return two knights for the body of their county, with 
two citizens or burghers for every city and borough contained 
in it." 

Although the knights of the different shires had in several 
instances before this been represented by delegates, so that the 
principle of representation was not now for the first time intro- 
duced into the English constitution, still this was the first time 
when plain untitled citizens, or burghers, had been called to take 
their place with the barons, bishops, and knights, in the great 
council of the nation, to join in deliberations on the affairs of the 
realm.^ 

5 At first the burghers could take part only in questions relating to taxation, but 
gradually they acquired the right to share in all matters that might come before 
Parliament. Just thirty years later (in 1295), in the reign of Edward I, there was 
gathered through regular constitutional summons what came to be called the Model 
Parliament, since in its composition it served as a pattern for later Parliaments. 



CONQUEST OF WALES 



205 



From this gathering, then, may be dated the birth of the 
House of Commons (1265). Formed as it was of knights and 
burghers, representatives of the common people, it was at first a 
weak and timorous body, quite overawed by the great lords, but 
was destined finally to grow into the controlling branch of the 
British Parliament. 

212. Conquest of Wales (12 72-1 282). — For more than seven 
hundred years after the withdrawal of the Romans from Britain, 
the Celtic tribes of Wales maintained among their mountain 
fastnesses an ever-renewed struggle with the successive invaders 
of the island, — with Saxon, Dane, and Norman. They were 




Fig. 38. — Carnarvon Castle. (From a photograph) 

This fortress was founded by Edward I in 1283. It is one of the most impressive 

of the decayed mediaeval strongholds of the British Isles 

forced to acknowledge the overlordship of some of the Saxon and 
Norman kings ; but they were restless vassals, and were constantly 
withholding tribute and refusing homage. 

When Edward I (i 272-1307) came to the English throne, 
Llewellyn III, who held the overlordship of the Welsh chiefs, 
refused to render homage to the new king. Edward led a strong 
army into the fastnesses of the country and quickly reduced his 
rebel vassal to submission. A few years later, and the Welsh 
patriots were again in arms ; but the uprising was soon crushed, 
and Llewellyn was slain (1282). His head, after the barbarous 
manner of the times, was exposed over the gateway of the Tower 
of London. The last remnant of Welsh independence was now 
extinguished. Edward made his little son, born during the 



206 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

campaign, feudal lord of the Welsh, with the title of Prince of 
Wales ; and from that time the title has usually been borne by 
the eldest son of the English sovereign. 

The strong- walled and picturesque castle-fortresses — those at 
Conway and Carnarvon are particularly celebrated — which Edward 
built or strengthened to guard the conquered land are, like the 
old watch-towers of the Norman kings in England (sec. ii6), 
historical monuments of the greatest interest to the modern 
traveler in Wales. 

For two centuries after the death of Llewellyn the Welsh were 
the unwilling and at times rebellious subjects of England. Then 
occurred a happy circumstance, — the accession to the English 
throne of a prince of Welsh descent ; for Henry Tudor, the first 
of the Tudor dynasty, was the grandson of a Welsh knight, named 
Owen Tudor. With princes of the ancient British race reigning in 
London, the Welsh, from sullen subjects, were suddenly transformed 
into enthusiastic and loyal supporters of the English throne. 

213. Wars with Scotland (12 9 6-1 3 2 8). — From the time of 
King Alfred's son Edward, the kings of England had intermit- 
tently laid claim to the suzerainty of the Scottish realm. The 
Norman and Plantagenet kings down to the time of Edward I 
were constantly quarreling with the Scots about this matter of 
English overlordship and Scotch vassalage. During Edward I's 
reign an opportunity presented itself for a seemingly final settle- 
ment of the question. In 1285 the ancient Celtic line of Scot- 
tish chiefs became extinct. A great number of claimants for the 
vacant throne immediately arose. Chief among these were Robert 
Bruce and John Balliol, distinguished noblemen of Norman descent, 
attached to the Scottish court. Edward was asked to act as arbi- 
trator and decide to whom the crown should be given. He con- 
sented to do so, but only on condition that the Scottish nobles 
should do homage to him as their overlord. This they were 
constrained to do. Edward's commissioners then decided the 
question of the succession in favor of Balliol, who now took 
the crown of Scotland as the fully acknowledged vassal of the 
English sovereign (1292"), 



WAkS WITH SCOTLAND 



207 



Balliol soon broke the feudal ties which bound him to Edward 
and sought an alliance with the French king. In the war that 
followed the Scots were defeated and Scotland fell back as a for- 
feited fief into the hands of Edward (1296). As a sign that the 
Scottish kingdom had come to an end, Edward carried off to 
London the royal regalia, and with this a large stone, known as 
the Stone of Scone, upon which the Scottish kings, from time out 
of memory, had been accustomed 
to be crowned. The block was taken 
to Westminster Abbey, and there 
put beneath the seat of a stately 
throne-chair, which to this day is 
used in the coronation ceremonies 
of the English sovereigns. 

The two countries were not long 
united. The Scotch people loved 
too well their ancient liberties to 
submit quietly to this extinguish- 
ment of their national independence. 
Under the inspiration and lead of 
the famous Sir William Wallace, an 
outlaw knight, all the Lowlands were 
soon in determined revolt. Wallace 
gained some successes,^ but at 
length was betrayed into Edward's 
hands. He was condemned to death 
as a traitor, and his head, garlanded 
with a crown of laurel, was fixed on 
London Bridge (1305). The romantic life of Wallace, his patriotic 
services, his heroic exploits, and his tragic death at once lifted 
him to the place that he has ever since held as the national hero 
of Scotland. 

The struggle in which Wallace had fallen was soon renewed by 
the almost equally renowned hero Robert Bruce (grandson of the 
Robert Bruce mentioned above), who was the representative 

6 Notably a great victory at what is known as the battle of Stirling (1297), 




Fig. 39. — Coronation Chair 
IN Westminster Abbey 

Beneath the seat is the celebrated 
Scottish Stone of Scone, which 
was carried away from Scotland 
by Edward I 



2o8 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

of the nobles, as Wallace had been of the common people. With 
Edward 11 ' Bruce fought the great battle of Bannockburn, near 
Stirling. Edward's army was almost annihilated (13 14). It was 
the most appalling disaster that had befallen the arms of the Eng- 
lish people since the memorable defeat of Harold at Hastings. 

The independence of Scotland really dates from the great 
victory of Bannockburn, but the English were too proud to 
acknowledge it until after fourteen years more of war. Finally, 
in the year 1328, the young king Edward III gave up all claim 
to the Scottish crown, and Scotland, with the hero Bruce as its 
king, took its place as an independent power among the nations 
of Europe. 

Respecting the results to both the EngHsh and the Scotch of 
the failure of the Edwards to subject Scotland to their rule, the 
historian Gardiner finely comments as follows : " Morally, both 
nations were in the end the gainers. The hardihood and self- 
reliance of the Scottish character is distinctly to be traced to 
those years of struggle against a powerful neighbor. England, 
too, was the better for being balked of its prey. No nation can 
suppress the liberty of another without endangering its own." 

The independence gained by the Scotch at Bannockburn was 
maintained for nearly three centuries, — until 1603, — when the 
crowns of England and Scotland were peacefully united in the 
person of James VI of Scotland, who became Jarnes I of Eng- 
land, the founder of the Stuart dynasty of EngHsh kings. During 
the greater part of these three hundred years the two countries 
were very quarrelsome neighbors. 

The Hundred Years' War {1338-1453) 

214. Causes of the War. — The long and wasteful war between 
England and France known in history as the Hundred Years' 
War was a most eventful one, and its effect upon both England 

7 Edward I died while on a campaign against the Scots (1307). He was one of 
the ablest and best beloved of English kings. He so improved the laws of the 
realm, and made such great and beneficent changes in the administration of justice 
as to earn the title of the " English Justinian." 



THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR 209 

and France so important and lasting as to entitle it to a promi- 
nent place in the records of the closing events of the Middle 
Ages. Freeman likens the contest to the Peloponnesian War in 
ancient Greece; and Hallam says that since the fall of Rome 
there had been no war among European nations " so memorable 
as that of Edward III and his successors against France, whether 
we consider its duration, its objects, or the magnitude and 
variety of its events." 

The war with Scotland was one of the things that led up to 
this war. All through that struggle France, as the old and 
jealous rival of England, was ever giving aid and encouragement 
to the Scots. Then the EngUsh possessions in France, for which 
the English king owed homage to the French sovereign as over- 
lord, were a source of constant dispute between the two countries. 
Trade jealousies also contributed to the causes of mutual hostility. 

Furthermore, upon the death of Charles IV of France, the last 
of the direct Capetian line, Edward III laid claim to the French 
crown in much the same way that William of Normandy centuries 
before had laid claim to the crown of England. 

215. The Battle of Crecy (1346). — The first great combat of 
the long war was the famous battle of Cr^cy. Edward had 
invaded France with a strong force, made up largely of EngHsh 
bowmen, and had penetrated far into the country, ravaging the 
land as he went, when he finally halted and faced the pursuing 
French army near the village of Cr^cy, where he inflicted upon it 
a most terrible defeat. Twelve hundred knights, the flower of 
French chivalry, and thousands of foot soldiers lay dead upon 
the field. 

The great battle of Cr^cy is memorable for several reasons; 
but chiefly because feudalism and chivalry there received their 
deathblow. "The whole social and pohtical fabric of the Mid- 
dle Ages," writes Green, "rested on a mihtary base, and its 
base was suddenly withdrawn. The churl had struck down the 
noble ; the bowman proved more than a match, in sheer hard 
fighting, for the knight. From the day of Cr^cy feudahsm tot- 
tered slowly but surely to its grave." The battles of the world 



2IO GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

were thereafter to be fought and won, not by mail-clad knights 
with battle-ax and lance, but by common foot soldiers with bow 
and gun. 

216. The Siege and Capture of Calais (1346-1347). — From 
the field of Crecy Edward led his army to Calais, which fell into 
his hands at the end of a year's siege. This was a very important 
event for the English, as it gave them control of the commerce 
of the Channel and aiforded a convenient landing place for their 
expeditions of invasion. 

217. The Black Death (1347-1349). — At just this time there 
fell upon Europe the awful pestilence known as the Black Death. 
The plague was introduced from the East by way of the trade 
routes of the Mediterranean, and from the southern countries 
spread in the course of a few years over the entire continent, its 
virulence without doubt being greatly increased by the unsanitary 
condition of the crowded towns and the wretched mode of living 
of the poorer classes. 

In many places almost all the people fell victims to the scourge. 
Some villages were left without an inhabitant. Many monasteries 
were almost emptied. In the Mediterranean and the Baltic ships 
were seen drifting about without a soul on board. Crops rotted 
unharvested in the fields; herds and flocks wandered about 
unattended. It is estimated that from one third to one half of 
the population of Europe perished. Hecker, an historian of the 
pestilence, estimates the total number of victims at twenty-five 
millions. It was the most awful calamity that ever befell the 
human race.^ 

218. The Battle of Poitiers (1356). — The terrible scourge 
caused the contending nations for a time to forget their quarrel. 
But no sooner had a purer atmosphere breathed upon the conti- 
nent than their minds were again turned to war, and the old 
struggle was renewed with fresh eagerness. 



8 Under the terror and excitement of the dreadful visitation, religious penitents, 
thinking to turn away the wrath of Heaven by unusual penances, went about in pro- 
cession, lacerating themselves with whips (hence they were called flagellants). This 
religious frenzy had its most remarkable manifestation in Germany. 



THE PEASANTS' REVOLT 21 1 

Edward planned a double invasion of France. He himself led 
an army through the already wasted provinces of the north, 
while his eldest son, known from the color of the armor he wore 
as the Black Prince, ravaged with another the rich lands of the 
south. As the prince's army, numbering about eight thousand 
men, loaded with booty, was making its way back to the coast, it 
found its path, near Poitiers, blocked by a French army of fifty 
thousand, led by King John, the successor of Philip. A battle 
ensued which proved for the French a second Crecy. The arrows 
of the Enghsh bowmen drove them in fatal panic from the field, 
which was strewn with thousands of their dead. King John and 
his son Philip were taken prisoners. 

219. The Peasants' Revolt (1381). — During most of the half 
century succeeding the treaty that soon followed the battle of 
Poitiers,^ the war between the two countries was practically sus- 
pended. The most important event in English history during this 
interval was what is known as the Peasants' Revolt. 

One of the grievances of the peasants grew out of their rela- 
tions to the landlords. Many of the former serfs had commuted 
into money payments the personal services they owed their lords 
(sec. 95) and had thus got rid of this badge of serfdom. They 
were now free laborers working for hire. The rise in wages occa- 
sioned by the Black Death caused the landlords to regret the 
bargain they had made with their former serfs, since the commu- 
tation money would not now pay for as many days' labor as the 
serfs were originally bound to render. The landlords endeavored 
to escape from their bad bargain by means of legislation. They 
secured the enactment by Parliament of a law known as the Statute 
of Laborers (135 1), which made it a misdemeanor for any unem- 
ployed laborer to refuse to work for the wages paid before the 
plague. Attempts to enforce this statute caused much discontent 
and trouble. 



9 The Treaty of Bretigny (1360). By the terms of this treaty Edward was to 
keep possession of the duchy of Aquitaine and some other provinces, not, however, as 
fiefs from the French king, in which way he had hitherto held his lands in France, 
but in full sovereignty. 



212 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

The hard conditions under which those still held in serfdom 
led their lives constituted another grievance of a large class. In 
these words of one of the leaders of the uprising we hear the 
burden of their complaint : *' For what reason do they hold us 
in bondage ? Are we not all descended from the same parents 
Adam and Eve? And what can they show, or what reasons give, 
why they should be more the masters than ourselves?" 

A third grievance of the peasants, and seemingly the immediate 
cause of the revolt, was the imposition of a heavy poll tax, which 
struck the poor as well as the rich, to meet the expenses of the 
French war. 

The storm burst in 1381. The peasants rose in almost every 
part of England and marched in crowds upon London. Their 
most noted leaders were Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, and John Ball. 
The essence of their demands was the abolition of villanage 
(serfdom) in England. 

There was tumult and violence everywhere. Abbeys and manor 
houses were sacked, and the charters which were the evidence of 
the peasants' servitude were burned. The revolt had the usual 
issue. The bands of insurgents were finally scattered and their 
leaders were pitilessly put to death. 

Yet the insurrection was a success after all. The fear of another 
uprising and the inefficient character of sullen labor caused the 
landlords to hasten the process that had long been going on of 
commuting into money payments or rents the grudgingly rendered 
personal services of the serfs. At the end of a hundred years after 
the revolt there were very few serfs to be found in England. 

The abolition of serfdom was an important step in" the nation- 
alization of the English people. Sweeping away artificial barriers 
between classes, it hastened the unification of English society and 
the creation of a true English nation. 

220. Battle of Agincourt (1415). — During the reign in England 
of Henry V, the second sovereign of the House of Lancaster, 
France was unfortunate in having an insane king, Charles VI ; and 
Henry, taking advantage of the disorder into which the French 
kingdom naturally fell under these circumstances, invaded the 



JOAN OF ARC 



213 




country with a powerful army. After losing a great part of his 
followers through sickness, Henry finally, with a force of only 
about ten thousand men, chiefly archers, met a French feudal 
army fifty thousand strong on the field of Agincourt. The French 
suffered a most humiliating defeat, their terrible losses falling, 
as at Crecy, chiefly upon 
the knighthood. Five 
years later was con- 
cluded the Treaty of 
Troyes, according to the 
terms of which the 
French crown, upon 
the death of Charles, 
was to go to the English 
king. 

221. Joan of Arc; the 
Relief of Orleans (1429). 
— But patriotism was 
not yet wholly extinct 

among the French people. There were many who regarded the 
concessions of the Treaty of Troyes as not only weak and shame- 
ful but as unjust to the Dauphin Charles, who was thereby disin- 
herited, and they accordingly refused to be bound by its provisions. 
Consequently, when the poor insane king died, the terms of the 
treaty could not be carried out in full, and the war dragged on. 
The party that stood by their native prince, afterwards crowned 
as Charles VII, were at last reduced to most desperate straits. The 
greater part of the country was in the hands of the English, who 
were holding in close siege the important city of Orleans (1428). 

But the darkness was the deep gloom that precedes the dawn. 
A better day was about to rise over the distressed country. A 
strange deliverer now appears, — the famous Joan of Arc. This 
young peasant girl, with soul sensitive to impressions from brood- 
ing over her country's wrongs and sufferings, saw visions and heard 
voices which bade her undertake the work of delivering France. 
She was obedient unto the heavenly voices. 



Fig. 40. — Charge of French Knights 
AND Flight of English Arrows 



214 



GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 



The warm, impulsive French nation, ever quick in responding to 
appeals to the imagination, was aroused exactly as it was stirred by 
the voice of the preachers of the Crusades. Religious enthusiasm 
now accomplished what patriotism alone could not do. 

Rejected by some, yet received by most of her countrymen 
as a messenger from Heaven, the maiden kindled throughout the 
land a flame of enthusiasm that nothing could resist. Inspiring 
the dispirited French soldiers with new courage, she forced the 
English to raise the siege of Orleans (from which exploit she' be- 
came known as the Maid 
of Orleans), and speedily 
brought about the corona- 
tion of Prince Charles at 
Rheims (1429). Shortly 
afterward she fell into the 
hands of the English, was 
tried by ecclesiastical 
judges for witchcraft and 
heresy, and was con- 
demned to be burned as 
a heretic and a witch. 
Her martyrdom took 
place at Rouen in the 
year 1431. 

But the spirit of the 
Maid had already taken 
possession of the French 
nation. From this on, the 
war, though long con- 
tinued, went steadily against the English. Little by little they 
were pushed off from the soil they had conquered, and driven 
out of their own Gascon lands of the south as well, until finally 
they held nothing in the land save Calais. Thus ended, in 1453, 
the year of the fall of Constantinople, the Hundred Years' War. 

222. Effects upon England of the War. — The most important 
effects of the war as concerns England were the enhancement of 




Fig. 41. — Joan of Arc. (From a photo- 
graph of a beautiful painting in the His- 
torical Gallery at Versailles) 

We have no authentic likeness of Joan of Arc. 
The above must be regarded as an ideaUzed 
portrait 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES 215 

the power of the Lower House of ParHament and the awakening 
of a national spirit. The maintaining of the long and costly 
quarrel called for such heavy expenditures of men and money 
that the English kings were made more dependent than hitherto 
upon the representatives of the people, who were careful to make 
their grants of supplies conditional upon the correction of abuses 
or the confirming of their privileges. Thus the war served to 
make the Commons a power in the English government. 

Again, as the war was participated in by all classes alike, the 
great victories of Crecy, Poitiers, and Agincourt aroused a national 
pride, which led to a closer union between the different elements 
of society. Normans and English, enlisted in a common enterprise, 
were fused by the ardor of a common patriotic enthusiasm into a 
single people. The real national life of England dates from this 
time. 

The Wars of the Roses {14^^-1485) 

223. Introductory. — The Wars of the Roses is the name given 
to a long contest between the adherents of the houses of York and 
Lancaster, rival branches of the royal family of England. The 
strife was so named because the Yorkists adopted as their badge 
a white rose and the Lancastrians a red one. 

224. Chief Battles of the War. — The three battles which may 
be made to serve as landmarks of the struggle were the first battle 
of St. Albans (1455), the battle of Towton Field (1461), and the 
battle of Bosworth Field (1485). The first marks the commence- 
ment of the struggle. The second was the most terrible battle 
fought in England after that of Hastings. The third battle marks 
the close of the war. In this fight King Richard III,^'^ the last of 
the House of York, was overthrown and slain by Henry Tudor, 
Earl of Richmond, who was crowned on the field with the diadem 
which had fallen from the head of Richard, and saluted as King 
Henry VII. With him began the dynasty of the Tudors. 

10 This is the Richard who, in order to make secure his title to the crown, is 
believed to have caused the murder of the two little princes, his nephews, in the 
Tower of London (1483). 



2l6 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

225. The Effects of the Wars. — The first important result of 
the Wars of the Roses was the ruin of the baronage of England. 
One half of the nobility were slain. Those that survived were 
ruined, their estates having been wasted or confiscated during the 
progress of the struggle. Not a single great house retained its 
old-time wealth and influence. The war marks the final downfall 
of feudalism in England. 

The second result of the struggle sprang from the first. This 
was the great peril into which English liberty was cast by the 
ruin of the nobility. It was primarily the barons who had forced 
the Great Charter from King John, and who had kept him and 
his successors from reigning like absolute monarchs. Now the 
once proud and powerful barons were ruined, and their confis- 
cated estates had gone to increase the influence and patronage of 
the sovereign, who when strong and willful, like Henry VIII, did 
pretty much as he pleased and became unjust and tyrannical. 
In short, upon the ruins of the baronage was erected something 
like a royal despotism. Not until the revolution of the seven- 
teenth century did the people, by overturning the throne of the 
Stuarts, curb the undue power of the crown and recover their 
lost liberties. 

Growth of the English Language and Literature 

226. The Language. — From the Norman Conquest to the 
middle of the fourteenth century there were in use in England 
three languages : Norman French was the speech of the con- 
querors and the medium of polite hterature; Saxon, or Old 
Enghsh, was the tongue of the conquered people; while Latin 
was the language of the laws and records, of the Church services, 
and of the works of the learned. 

Modern EngUsh is the old Saxon tongue worn and improved 
by use, and enriched by a large infusion of Norman-French 
words, with less important additions from the Latin and other 
languages. It took the place of the Norman-French in the courts 
of law about the middle of the fourteenth century. At tlais time 



ENGLISH LITERATURE 



217 



the language was broken up into many dialects, and the expression 
" King's English " is supposed to have referred to the standard 
form employed in state documents and in use at court. 

227. Effect of the Norman Conquest on English Literature. — 

The blow that struck down King Harold and his brave thanes on 
the field of Hastings silenced for the space of above a century the 
voice of EngHsh hterature. The tongue of the conquerors became 
the speech of the court, the nobility, and the clergy ; while the 
language of the despised English was, like themselves, crowded 
out of every place of honor. But when, after a few generations, 
the downtrodden race began to reassert itself, Enghsh literature 
emerged from its obscurity, and, with an utterance somewhat 
changed, — yet unmistakably it is the same voice, — resumed its 
interrupted lesson and its broken song. 

228. Chaucer (i34o?-i4oo). — Holding a position high above 
all other writers of early Enghsh is Geoffrey Chaucer. He is 
the first in time, and, after Shakespeare, perhaps the first in 
genius, among the great poets of the English-speaking race. 
He is reverently called the " Father of EngHsh poetry." 

Chaucer stands between two ages, the mediaeval and the mod- 
ern. He felt not only the influences of the age of feudalism 
which was passing away, but. also those of the new age of learn- 
ing and freedom which was dawning. It is because he was so 
sensitive to these various influences, and reflects his surround- 
ings so faithfully in his writings, that these are so valuable as 
interpreters of the period in which he lived. 

Chaucer's greatest and most important work is his Canterbury 
Tales. The poet represents himself as one of a company of story- 
telling pilgrims who have set out on a journey to the tomb of 
.Thomas Becket at Canterbury (sec. 208). The persons, thirty- 
two in number, making up the party, xepresent almost every 
calling and position in the middle class of English society. The 
prologue, containing characterizations of the different members 
of the company, is the most valuable part of the production. 
Here as in a gallery we have shown to us faithful portraits of 
pur ancestors of the fourteenth century. 



2l8 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

229. William Langland. — The genial Chaucer shows us the 
pleasant, attractive side of English society and life ; William 
Langland, another writer of the same period, in a poem called 
the Vision of Piers the Plowman (1362), lights up for us the world 
of the poor and the oppressed. 

This poem quivers with sympathy for the hungry, labor-worn 
peasant, doomed to a life of weary routine and hopelessness, 
despised by haughty lords and robbed by shameless ecclesiastics. 
The long wars with France had demoralized the nation ; the Black 
Death had just reaped its awful harvest among the ill-clad, ill-fed, 
and ill-housed poor. Occasional outbursts of wrath against the 
favored classes are the mutterings of the storm soon to burst upon 




Fig. 42. — Plowing Scene. (From a manuscript of the 
fourteenth century) 

the social world in the fury of the Peasants' Revolt, and later upon 
the religious world in the upheavals of the Reformation. 

230. John Wycliffe (13 24-1 384) and the Lollards. — Foremost 
among the reformers and religious writers of the period under 
review was John Wycliffe, called " the Morning Star of the Ref- 
ormation." This bold reformer attacked first many of the prac- 
tices and then certain of the doctrines of the Church. He gave the 
English people the first translation of the entire Bible in the English 
language. There was no press at this time to multiply editions of 
the book, but by means of manuscript copies it was widely circu- 
lated and read. Its influence was very great, and from its appear- 
ance may be dated the beginnings of the Reformation in England. 

Wycliffe did not wholly escape persecution in life, and his 
bones were not permitted to rest in peace. His enemies attrib- 
uted to his teachings the unrest and the revolt of the peasants, 



CAXTON AND THE PRINTING PRESS 219 

and this caused him to be looked upon by many as a dangerous 
agitator. In 141 5 the Council of Constance (sec. 259) pro- 
nounced his doctrines heretical, and ordered that his body be 
taken from its tomb and burned. This was done, and the ashes 
were thrown into a neighboring stream called the Swift. "This 
brook," in the words of the old ecclesiastical writer, Thomas 
Fuller, " hath conveyed his ashes into Avon, Avon into Severn, 
Severn into the Narrow Seas, they into the ocean ; and thus the 
ashes of Wycliffe are the emblem of his doctrine, which now is 
dispersed all the world over." 

The followers of Wycliffe became known as Lollards (babblers), 
a term applied to them in derision. Their religious opinions were 
regarded as erroneous or as heretical; and heresy at that tirne 
was hated and feared, at least by those in authority. Parliament 
passed a law (1401) known as the Statute for the Burning of 
Heretics, which made it the duty of the proper civil officers, in 
cases of persons convicted of heresy by the ecclesiastical courts, 
to receive the same and " before the people, in a high place, cause 
them to be burnt, that such punishment may strike fear to the 
hearts of others." 

Heretics had been burned in England before the passage of 
this law, but now for the first time did Parliament by special 
enactment make this form of punishment the penalty for reli-' 
gious dissent. It was the opening of a sad chapter in English 
history. Under the statute many persons whose only fault was 
the teaching or the holding of rehgious opinions different from 
those of the Church perished at the stake. 

231. Caxton (1412-1491) and the Printing Press. — The great 
religious movement referred to in the preceding paragraph, which 
during the sixteenth century transformed the face of England, 
was hastened by the introduction of printing into the island by 
William Caxton towards the close of the fifteenth century. The 
first work which appeared from his press was entitled the Game 
of Chess (1474). He also printed Chaucer's Canterbury Tales ^ 
and almost everything else worth reproducing then existing in 
English, besides various works from the Latin and the French. 



220 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

The eagerness with which the books which fell from Caxton's 
press were seized and read by all classes indicates the increasing 
activity and thoughtfulness of the public mind. Manifestly a 
new day — one to be filled with intellectual and moral revolu- 
tions — was breaking over the land of Alfred and of Wycliffe. 

II. Feance 

232 . Beginnings of the French Kingdom. — The separate history 
of France may be regarded as beginning with the partition of 
Verdun in 843. At that time the Carolingians, of whom we have 
already learned (Chapter VII), exercised the royal power. 

Just at the close of the tenth century, in 987, the 'Capetian 
dynasty acceded to the throne. The direct Capetian line ruled 
until 1328, when the Valois branch of the house came into power 
and ruled until the accession, in 1589, of Henry IV, the first 
of the Bourbons. 

We shall now direct attention to the important transactions of 
the period covered by the mediaeval Capetian kings. Our special 
aim will be to give prominence to those matters which concern 
the gradual consolidation of the French monarchy and the develop- 
ment among the French people of the sentiment of nationality. 

France under the Direct Line of the Capetians {g8y-ij28) 

233. General Statement. — The Capetian dynasty takes its 
name from Hugh Capet, Duke of Francia; the first of the house. 
The direct line embraced fourteen kings, whose united reigns 
spanned a space of three hundred and forty-one years.^^ 



11 Table of the Capetian Kings (direct line) 

Hugh Capet 987-996 Louis VIII (the Lion) 

Robert II (the Pious) . 996-1031 Louis IX (the Saint) . 

Henry I 1031-1060 Phihp III (the Bold) . 

Phihp I 1060-1108 Philip IV (the Fair) . 

Louis VI (the Fat) . . 1108-1137 'Lonis X (le ffutin) . 

Louis VII (the Young) . 1137-1180 Philip V (the Tall) . 

Philip II (Augustus) . . 1180-1223 Charles IV (the Fair) . 



1223-1226 
1226-1270 
1270-1285 
1285-1314 
1314-1316 
1316-1322 
1322-1328 



•, BR'ABANT ^ 




E-ennes MAINE 



••ffi 



1 .,>^* 



Le Mau^J /" 



/I ) Tfoyes\ <' 



^ All ire 







MARCHE 



f VV 4 

-Bordfeatix 









moges /-s^ 



i^K^VJs |g 




i 'T^fM.-N. WORKS, EUF 



"3 Th'T? a IVf^T' 



50 100 



Scale ofMiles. 



Hoyal Domain 

^ Fiefs held by the English King 

I 1 Fiefs lield by other Vassals 



FRANCE UNDER THE CAPETIANS 221 

The first Capetian king differed from his vassal counts and 
dukes simply in having a more dignified title ; his power was 
scarcely greater than that of many of the lords who paid him 
homage as their suzerain. But through forfeiture, conquest, and 
marriage alliances, one after another of the feudal fiefs was added 
to the royal domains, until finally the greater part of the kingdom 
was ruled directly by the crown. Before the close of the Middle 
Ages France had come to be one of the most compact and power- 
ful kingdoms in Europe. How various circumstances conspired 
to build up the power of the kings at the expense of that of the 
great feudal lords and of the Church will appear as we go on. , 

In this place, however, it should be noted that nothing con- 
tributed more to the strength and influence of the monarchy 
during the period of which we are speaking than the fortunate 
circumstance that for eleven generations, from the accession 
of Hugh Capet in 987 to the death of Philip the Fair in 13 14, 
no French king lacked a son to whom to transmit his authority. 
For over three centuries the title was transmitted directly from 
father to son. With no disputed successions the monarchy grew 
steadily in power and prestige. 

The most noteworthy events of the earlier Capetian period, 
regarded from the point of view of the growth of the French 
kingdom, were the acquisition by the French crown of the greater 
part of the English possessions in France, the Crusades, the 
admission of the Third Estate to the National Assembly, and the 
abolition of the order of the Templars. Of these several matters 
we will now speak in order. 

234. The Acquisition of the English Possessions in France 

In our sketch of the growth of England we spoke of the extensive 
possessions of the first Angevin kings in France, and told how 
the larger part of these feudal lands were lost through King John's 
misconduct and resumed as forfeited fiefs by his suzerain Philip 
Augustus, king of France (sec. 209). The annexation of these 
large and flourishing provinces to the crown of France brought a 
vast accession of power and patronage to the king, who was now 
easily the superior of any of his great vassals. 



222 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

235. The French and the Crusades. — The age of the Capetians 
was the age of the Crusades. These romantic expeditions, while 
stirring all Christendom, appealed especially to the ardent, imagi- 
native genius of the Gallic race. Three Capetian kings, Louis VII, 
Philip Augustus, and Louis IX, were themselves leaders of crusades. 
It was the great predominance of French-speaking persons among 
the first crusaders which led the Eastern peoples to call them all 
Franks, the term still used throughout the East to designate 
Europeans, irrespective of their nationality. 

But it is only the influence of the Crusades on the French mon- 
archy that we need to notice in this place. They tended very 
materially to weaken the power and influence of the feudal nobiHty, 
and in a corresponding degree to strengthen the authority of the 
crown and add to its dignity. The way in which they brought about 
this transfer of power from the aristocracy to the king has been 
already explained in the chapter on the Crusades (sec. 158). 

In that same chapter we also saw how the crusade against the 
Albigenses resulted in the almost total extirpation of that hereti- 
cal sect and in the final acquisition by the French crown of large 
and rich territories formerly held by the counts of Toulouse, the 
patrons of the heretics. 

236. Admission of the Third Estate to the National Assembly 
(1302). — The event of the greatest political significance in the 
Capetian age was the admission, in the reign of Philip the Fair, 
of the representatives of the towns to the National Assembly. 
This transaction is in French history what the creation of the 
House of Commons is in Enghsh history (sec. 211). The popular 
branches of the two councils were, however, called to take part 
in the administration of public affairs under very different circum- 
stances. In England it was the nobiHty that sought the people's 
aid in their struggle with a despotic king. In France it was the 
king who summoned the burghers to assist him in his quarrel with 
the papal see. But the fact that the aid of the commons was 
courted, whether by nobles or by king, indicates that in both 
countries the middle class was rising into political importance, 
and was holding in its hands the balance of power. 



THE ORDER OF THE TEMPLARS 223 

The dispute between Philip and the Pope to which we have 
just referred, arose, it will be recalled, respecting the control of 
the offices and revenues of the Church in France (sec. 168). In 
order to rally to his support all classes throughout his kingdom, 
Phiiip called a meeting of the National Assembly, to which he 
invited representatives .of the burghers, or inhabitants of the 
towns (1302). This council had hitherto been made up of two 
estates only, — the nobles and the clergy ; now is added what 
comes to be known as the Tiers Etat, or Third Estate, while 
the assembly henceforth is called the Estates- or States-General. 
Before the growing power of this Third Estate — a power devel- 
oped however outside and not within the National Assembly 
itself — we shall see the Church, the nobility, and the monarchy 
all go down, just as in England we shall see clergy, nobles, and 
king yield to the rising power of the English Commons. 

237. The Abolition of the Order of the Templars (1307). — The 
abolition of the order of the Knights of the Temple by Philip 
the Fair affords in some measure a parallel to the suppression of 
the Enghsh monasteries by Henry VIII in the sixteenth century. 

We have already, in connection with the history of the Crusades, 
learned about the origin of the Templars (sec. 143). In recogni- 
tion of their services, they had had bestowed upon them, through 
the gifts of the pious and the grants of princes, enormous riches 
and the most unusual privileges. The number of manors and 
castles that they held in the different countries of Europe, but 
chiefly in France, is estimated at from nine to ten thousand. But 
gain in wealth and power had been accompanied apparently by a 
loss in virtue and piety. At all events the most incredible rumors 
of the immoral and blasphemous character of the secret rites and 
ceremonies of the society were spread abroad. Its crimes were 
declared " sufficient to move the earth and disturb the elements." 

Taking advantage of the feeling against the order, Philip re- 
solved upon its destruction. He was moved doubtless by various 
motives, but beyond all question it was the riches of the society,— 
which Philip coveted, — and not its sins, that were the real cause 
of its undoing. 



224 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

The blow fell suddenly. Upon a preconcerted day (Oct. 13, 
1307) the chiefs of the order throughout the kingdom were 
arrested, and many of them afterwards put to death on various 
charges.^^ The great crime brought to Philip enormous wealth, 
which greatly enhanced the growing power and patronage of the 
crown, just as the strength and influence of Henry VIH of Eng- 
land were vastly increased by the confiscated wealth of the reli- 
gious houses he suppressed. 

France under the Medicevdl Valois'^^ {ij28-i4g8) 

238. Effects upon France of the Hundred Years' War. — The 

main interest of the period of French history upon which we here 
enter attaches to that long struggle between England and France 
known as the Hundred Years' War. Having already, in connec- 
tion with English affairs, touched upon the causes and incidents 
of this war, we shall here speak only of the effects of the strug- 
gle on the French people and kingdom. Among these must be 
noticed the almost complete prostration, by the successive shocks 
of Crecy, Poitiers, and Agincourt, of the French feudal aristocracy, 
which was already tottering to its fall through various undermining 
influences ; the growth of the power of the king, a consequence, 
largely, of the ruin of the nobility ; and, lastly, the awakening of 
a feeling of nationality and the drawing together of the hitherto 
isolated sections of the country by the attraction of a common 
and patriotic enthusiasm. Speaking broadly, we may say that by 
the close of the war feudalism in France was over, and that France 
had become, partly in spite of the war but more largely by reason 
of it, not only a great monarchy but a great nation. 

12 The order was formally abolished in 1312 by Pope Clement V, the first of the 
Avignon popes, who was wholly under the influence of Philip. 

13 The House of Valois, as already pointed out, was a branch of the Capetian 
family. The following table exhibits the names of the mediaeval Valois kings. 

Philip VI 1328-1350 Charles VII (the Vic- 
John (the Good) . . . 1350-1364 torious) 1422-1461 

Charles V (the Wise) . . 1364-1380 Louis XI 1461-1483 

Charles VI (the Well- Charles VIII (the 

Beloved) ..... 1380-1422 Affable) ,.,... 1483-1498 



LOUIS XI AND CHARLES THE BOLD 225 

239. Louis XI and Charles the Bold of Burgundy. — The founda- 
tions of the French monarchy, laid and cemented in the way we 
have seen, were greatly enlarged and strengthened by the unscru- 
pulous measures of Louis XI (1/^61-1483), who was a perfect 
Ulysses in cunning and deceit. His maxim was, " He who does 
not know how to dissimulate does not know how to reign." The 
great feudal lords that still retained power and influence he 
brought to destruction one after another, and united their fiefs 
to the royal domains. 

Of all the vassal nobles ruined by the craft of Louis, the most 
renowned and powerful was Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. 
Charles was endeavoring, out of a great patchwork of petty feudal 
states and semi-independent cantons and cities, to build up a 
^kingdom between Germany and France. His success in this effort 
would have meant practically a restoration of the old Lotharingian 
kingdom (see map, p. 68), which, it will be recalled, stretched 
across Europe from the Mediterranean to the North Sea. It seems 
one of the misfortunes of history that Charles did not succeed in 
his ambition. Such a kingdom as he planned might have proved 
a serviceable "buffer state" between France and Germany. 

For some of his lands Charles paid homage, or at least owed 
homage, to the king of France ; others he held as fiefs of the 
Holy Roman Empire. It is easy to understand how these rela- 
tions of Charles and his known ambitions should have set him 
apart as one whom his wily neighbor Louis would watch closely. 
Louis was frequently warring with the duke and forever intriguing 
against him. Upon the death of the duke — he was killed in 147 7 
in a battle with the Swiss — Louis, without clear right, seized a 
considerable part of his dominions. 

By cession and by inheritance Louis also added to France im- 
portant lands in the south (Provence, Roussillon, and Cerdagne), 
which gave the French kingdom a wider frontage upon the Medi- 
terranean, and made the Pyrenees its southern defense. 

240. Invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. — Charles VIII (1483- 
1498), son and successor of Louis XI, was the last of the mediae- 
val Valois. Through his marriage to Anne of Brittany he brought 



226 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

that great fief, which had hitherto constituted an almost inde- 
pendent, state, under the direct rule of the crown. 

Thus through the favor of a long series of circumstances, the 
persistent poUcy of his predecessors, and his own politic marriage 
Charles found himseK at the head of a kingdom which, gradually 
transformed from a feudal league into a true monarchy, had, by 
slow expansion, touched upon almost every side those Hmits which 
were to constitute substantially the boundaries of modem France. 

Charles was a romantic youth. His extravagant fancy led him 
to dream of some brilliant enterprise which should draw the gaze 
of the world, and which might contribute to the realization of his 
great project of making France instead of Germany the head of 
the world-empire. With a standing army, created by Charles VII 
during the latter years of the war with England,-^^ at his command, 
he invaded Italy, intent on the conquest of Naples, — to which 
he laid claim on the strength of an old bequest, — proposing, with 
that state subdued, to lead a crusade to the East against the Turks. 

Charles' march through Italy was a mere "promenade." In 
the early spring of the year 1495 he entered Naples in triumph. 
Here, in the midst of splendid ceremonies, he caused himself to 
be crowned " King of Naples, Sicily, and Jerusalem." 

Meanwhile the king of Aragon, the Venetians, and other powers 
were uniting their armies to punish the insolence and check the 
vaulting ambition of the would-be emperor and crusader. Only 
at the cost of a large part of his army did Charles succeed in 
making good his retreat into France. The forces he had left at 
Naples were quickly driven out of the place, and thus ended the 
youth's dream of a French world-empire. 

This enterprise of Charles is noteworthy not only because it 
marks the commencement of a long series of brilliant yet disas- 
trous campaigns carried on by the French in Italy, but further 
on account of Charles' army having been made up largely of 

14 The paid force of infantry and cavalry created by Charles VII in 1448 was 
the first standing army in Europe, and the beginning of that vast military system 
which now burdens the great nations of that continent with the support of several 
millions of soldiers constantly under arms. 



FORMATION OF THE FRENCH LANGUAGE 22/ 

paid troops instead of feudal retainers, which fact assures us that 
the feudal system, as a military organization, had practically come 
to an end. 



Formation of the French Language and the Beginnings of 
French Literature 

241. The Language. — The contact of the old Latin speech in 
Gaul with that of the Teutonic invaders gave rise there to two 
very distinct dialects. These were the Langue d' Oc, or Proven- 
gal, the tongue of the South of France and of the adjoining 
regions of Spain and Italy; and the Langue d' Oil, or French 
proper, the language of the North.^^ 

The soft, musical tongue of the South, predestined though it 
was to an early decay, was the first, as we shall learn in a 
moment, to develop a literature ; but when the North precipi- 
tated itself upon the South in the furious crusades against the 
Albigenses, the language, literature, and heretical religion of 
these southern provinces were all swept away together. As the 
persecuted faith was driven into obscurity, so in like manner the 
old speech was driven out of palace and court, and found a place 
only among the rude peasantry. 

The position of this once widely used Provencal speech among 
living languages may be illustrated by comparing its fortunes with 
those of the Celtic tongue in its conflict with the Anglo-Saxon 
in the British Isles. 

242. The Troubadours. — About the beginning of the twelfth 
century, by which time the Provengal tongue had become settled 
and somewhat polished, literature in France first began to find a 
voice in the songs of the Troubadours, the poets of the South. 
It is instructive to note that it was the home of the Albigensian 
heresy, the land that had felt the influence of every Mediter- 
ranean civiHzation, that was also the home of the Troubadour 
literature. The counts of Toulouse, the protectors of the heretics, 

15 The terms Langue d^Oc and Langue d'O'z/ zrose from the use of different words 
for " yes," which in the tongue of the South was oc, and in that of the North oi/. 



228 



GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 



were also the patrons of the poets. It was, as we have intimated, 
the same fierce persecution which uprooted the heretical faith 
that stilled the song of the Troubadours. 

The compositions of the Troubadours were, for the most part, 
love songs and satires. Among the countless minstrels of the 
South were some who acquired a fame which was spread through- 
out Christendom. 
The verses of the 
Troubadours were 
sung in every land, 
and to their stimu- 
lating influence the 
early poetry of al- 
most every people of 
Europe is largely in- 
debted. 

243. The Trou- 
veurs. — These were 
the poets of North- 
ern France, who com- 
FiG, 43. — In the Land of the Troubadours posed in the Langue 
-THE Castle of Foix. (From Smith, The ^, ^..^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^ 

Troubadours at Home) 

tongue. They flour- 
ished during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. As the poetical 
literature of the South found worthy patrons in the counts of 
Toulouse, so did that of the North find admiring encouragers in 
the dukes of Normandy. 

There was, however, a wide difference between the literature 
of Southern and that of Northern France. The compositions of 
the Troubadours were almost exclusively lyric songs, while those 
of the Trouveurs were chiefly epic or narrative poems, called 
rojnances. These latter celebrated the chivalrous exploits and 
loves of great princes and knights, and displayed at times almost 
Homeric animation and grandeur. Many of them gather about 
three famihar names, — Charlemagne, King Arthur, and Alexan- 
der the Great, — thus forming what are designated as the cycle 




FROISSART'S CHRONICLES 229 

of Charlemagne, the Arthurian or Armorican cycle, and the 
Alexandrian.^® 

The influence of these French romances upon the springing 
literatures of Europe was most inspiring and helpful. Nor has their 
influence yet ceased. Thus in English literature, not only did 
Chaucer and Spenser and all the early island poets draw inspiration 
from these fountains of Continental song, but the later Tennyson, 
in his Idylls of the King, has illustrated the power over the imagina- 
tion yet possessed by the Arthurian poems of the old Trouveurs. 

244. Froissart's Chronicles. — The iirst really noted prose 
writer in French Hterature was Froissart (about 1 337-1410), 
whose picturesqueness of style and skill as a story-teller have won 
for him the title of the " French Herodotus." Born, as he was, 
only a little after the opening of the Hundred Years' War, and 
knowing personally many of the actors in that long struggle, it 
was fitting that he should have become, as he did, the annalist 
of those stirring times. 

Froissart' s inimitable Chronicles have an added value from the 
age in which they were written. It was, as we have learned, a 
transition period. Feudalism was fast passing away and chivalry 
was beginning to feel the dissolving breath of a new era. But as 
the forests never clothe themselves in more gorgeous colors than 
when already touched by decay, so chivalry never arrayed itself 
in more splendid magnificence than when about to die. In the 
age of Edward III and the Black Prince it displayed its most 
sumptuous and prodigal splendor. And this is the age which the 
rare genius of Froissart has painted for us. ■ 

HI. Spain 

245. The Beginnings of Spain. — When, in the eighth century, 
the Saracens swept Hke a wave over Spain, the mountains of 
Asturias and Cantabria in the northwest corner of the peninsula 

16 These epics, it will be noticed, represent the three elements in the civilization 
of Western Europe, — the German, the Celtic, and the Graeco-Roman. It was the 
Crusades that brought in a fresh relay of tales and legends from the lands of the 
East (sec. 159). 



230 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

afforded a refuge for the most resolute of the Christian chiefs who 
refused to submit their necks to the Moslem yoke. These brave 
and hardy warriors not only successfully defended the hilly dis- 
tricts that formed their asylum, but gradually pushed back the 
invaders and regained control of a portion of the fields and cities 
that had been lost. 

By the opening of the eleventh century several little Christian 
states, among which we must notice especially the states of Castile 
and Aragon because of the prominent part they were to play in 
later history, had been established upon the ground thus recov- 
ered or always maintained. Castile was at first simply *' a line of 
castles " against the Moors, whence its name.. 

246. Union of Castile and Aragon (1479). — ^^^ several cen- 
turies the princes of the little states to which we have referred 
kept up an incessant warfare with their Mohammedan neighbors ; 
but, owing to dissensions among themselves, they were unable to 
combine in any effective way for the complete reconquest of their 
ancient possessions. But the marriage, in 1469, of Ferdinand, 
prince of Aragon, to Isabella, princess of Castile, paved the way 
for the virtual union in 1479 of these two leading states, both 
greatly enlarged since the eleventh century, into a single kingdom. 
By this happy union the quarrels of these two rival principalities 
were composed, and they were now free to employ their united 
strength in effecting what the Christian princes amidst all their 
contentions had never lost sight of, — the expulsion of the Moors 
from the peninsula. 

247. The Conquest of Granada (1492). — At the time when the 
basis of the Spanish monarchy was laid by the union of Castile 
and Aragon, the Mohammedan possessions had been reduced, by 
the constant pressure of the Christian chiefs through eight cen- 
turies, to a very limited dominion in the south of Spain. Here 
the Moors had established a strong, well-compacted state, known 
as the Kingdom of Granada. As soon as Ferdinand and Isabella 
had settled the affairs of their dominions, they began to make 
preparation for the reduction of this last stronghold of the 
Moorish power in the peninsula. 




The Alhambra : Palace of the Moorish Kings at Granada 
(From a photograph) 



THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA 23 1 

The Moors made a desperate defense of their Httle state. The 
struggle lasted for ten years. City after city fell into the hands 
of the Christian knights, and finally Granada, pressed by an army 
of seventy thousand, was forced to surrender, and the Cross 
replaced the Crescent on its walls and towers (1492). The 
Moors, or Moriscos, as they were called, were allowed to remain 
in the country, though under many annoying restrictions. What 
is known as their expulsion occurred at a later date (sec. 357). 

The fall of Granada holds an important place among the many 
significant events that mark the latter half of the fifteenth cen- 
tury. It marked the end, after an existence of almost eight hun- 
dred years, of Mohammedan rule in the Spanish peninsula, and 
thus formed an offset to the progress of the Moslem power in 
Eastern Europe and the loss to the Christian world of Constanti- 
nople. It advanced Spain to a place among the foremost nations 
of Europe, and gave her arms a prestige that secured for her 
position, influence, and deference long after the decline of her 
power had commenced. 

248. Influence upon the Spanish Character of the Moorish Domi- 
nation and the Moorish "Wars. — The long wars which the Spanish 
Christians waged against the Arab Moors left a deep impress 
upon the national character. In the first place, the opportunity 
which they afforded for knightly service and romantic adventure 
heightened that chivalrous spirit of which more than traces are 
noticeable in the feelings and the bearing of the Spaniard of 
to-day. 

In the second place, they made religion a thing of patriotism, 
and thus aroused religious zeal and fostered the growth of intol- 
erance. The unfortunate bias and temper thus imparted to the 
Spanish national character set Spain apart from the other Western 
nations, and affords the key to much of her later history both in 
Europe and in the New World. For illustration, it was, without 
doubt, the development in the Spanish people of this zealous, 
uncompromising religious spirit that helped to prepare the ground 
in Spain for the setting up there of the terrible tribunal of the 
Inquisition. 



232 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

249. The Inquisition. — The Inquisition, or Holy Office, was 
a tribunal the purpose of which was the detection and punish- 
ment of heresy* Its establishment in Spain casts a dark shadow 
upon the reign of the illustrious sovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella. 

Being employed by the government for the securing of politi- 
cal as well as rehgious ends, the tribunal became an instrument 
of the most incredible tyranny. The Jews were in this earlier 
period the chief victims of the court. Accompanying the an- 
nouncement of the sentences of the Holy Office there were solemn 
public ceremonies known as the auto de fe ("act of faith"). The 
assembly was held in some church or in the public square, and 
the following day those condemned to death were burned out- 
side the city walls. It is particularly to this last act of the drama 
that the term auto de fe has come popularly to be applied. 

The Inquisition secured for Spain unity of religious belief, but 
only through suppressing freedom of thought, and thereby sapping 
the strength and virility of the Spanish people. Whatever was most 
promising and vigorous was withered and blasted, or was cast out. 
In the year 1492 the Jews were expelled from the country. It is 
estimated that between two and three hundred thousand of this 
race were forced to seek an asylum in other lands. 

Thus at the same time that Ferdinand and Isabella were doing 
so much to foster the national life, their unfortunate religious zeal 
was planting the upas tree which was destined completely to over- 
shadow and poison the springing energies of the nation. 

250. Death of Ferdinand and Isabella. — Queen Isabella died 
in 1504, and Ferdinand followed her in the year 15 16, upon 
which latter event the crown of Spain descended to their grandson, 
Charles, of whom we shall hear much hereafter as the Emperor 
Charles V. With his reign the modern history of Spain begins. 




Fig. 44. — Recumbent Effigy of Queen Isabella. (From the 
magnificent sarcophagus in the Royal Chapel at Granada) 



SPANISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 233 

Beginnings of the Spanish Language and Literature 

251. The Language. — After the union of Castile and Aragon 
it was the language of the former that became the speech of the 
Spanish court. During the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella it 
gradually gained ascendancy over the numerous dialects of the 
country and became at last the national speech, just as in France 
the Langue d' Oil finally crowded out all other dialects. By the 
conquests and colonizations of the sixteenth century this Castilian 
speech was destined to become only less widely spread than is 
the English tongue. 

252. The Poem of the Cid. — Castilian or Spanish literature 
begins in the twelfth century with the romance poem of the Cid, 
one of the best known literary productions of the mediaeval period. 
This grand national poem was the outgrowth of the sentiments 
inspired by the long struggle between the Spanish Christians and 

'the Mohammedan Moors. The hero of the epic is Ruy Diaz, 
surnamed the Cid (meaning probably *'lord"), the champion of 
Christianity and Castilian royalty, during the latter part of the 
eleventh century, against the Saracens. He is made by the 
romancers to be the impersonation of every knightly virtue, — 
generosity, patriotism, courage, truthfulness, honor, and loyalty. 
The real Cid was quite a different character. 

The influence of the romance of the Cid in exciting the. senti- 
ment of Spanish patriotism and in stimulating the spirit of Spanish 
nationahty has been likened to the effects of the poems of Homer 
in creating fraternal bonds between the cities of ancient Hellas. 

IV. Germany 

253- Beginnings of the Kingdom of Germany. — The history 
of Germany as a separate kingdom begins with the break-up of 
the empire of Charlemagne, about the middle of the ninth cen- 
tury (sec. 79). The part to the east of the Rhine, with which 
fragment alone we are now specially concerned, was called the 
Kingdom of the Eastern Franks, in distinction from that to the 



234 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

west of the river, which was known as the Kingdom of the 
Western Franks. 

This Eastern Frankish kingdom was made up of several groups 
of tribes, — the Saxons, the Suabians, the Thuringians, the Bava- 
rians, and the East Franks, of which the latter were at this time 
chief, and gave name to the whole. Closely allied in race, speech, 
manners, and social arrangements, all these peoples seemed ready 
to be welded into a close and firm nation. That such was not 
the outcome of the historical development during mediaeval times 
was due largely to the adoption by the German emperors of an 
unfortunate policy respecting a world-empire. This matter will 
be explained in the following paragraphs. 

254. Revival of the Empire by Otto the Great (962); Conse- 
quences to Germany of its Renewal. — We have in another place, 
while tracing the history of the Empire, told how Otto I of Ger- 
many, in imitation of Charlemagne, restored the imperial authority 
(sec. 80). Otto's scheme respecting the establishment of a world- 
empire was a grand one, but, as had been demonstrated by the 
failure of the attempt of the great Charles, was an utterly imprac- 
ticable ideal. Yet the pursuit of this phantom by the German 
kings resulted in the most woeful consequences to Germany. 
Trying to grasp too much, the German rulers seized nothing at 
all. Attempting to be emperors of the world, they failed to 
become even kings of Germany. While they were engaged in 
outside enterprises their home affairs were neglected and the 
vassal princes of Germany succeeded in increasing their power 
and making themselves practically independent. 

Thus while the kings of England, France, and Spain were 
gradually consolidating their dominions and building up strong 
centralized monarchies on the ruins of feudalism, the preoccupied 
sovereigns of Germany were allowing the country to become split 
up into a great number of semi-independent states, the ambitions 
and jealousies of whose rulers were to postpone the unification of 
Germany for several hundred years — until our own day. 

Had the emperors inflicted loss and disaster upon Germany 
alone through this misdirection of their energies, the case would 



THE HOHENSTAUFEN EMPERORS 235 

not be so lamentable ; but the fair fields of Italy were for cen- 
turies made the camping field§, of the imperial armies, and the 
whole peninsula was kept embroiled with the quarrels of Guelphs 
and Ghibellines, and thus the nationahzation of the ItaHan people 
was also delayed for centuries. 

Germany received just one positive compensation for all this 
loss accruing from the ambition of her kings. This was the gift 
of Italian civilization, which came into Germany through the 
connections of the emperors with the peninsula. 

255. Germany under the Hohenstaufen Emperors (113 8- 1254). 
— The matter of chief importance during the rule of the Hohen- 
staufen or Suabian house was, as we have learned, the long and 
bitter conflict waged between the emperors of this family and 
the popes. 

The name of the most noted of the Hohenstaufen emperors — 
Frederick Barbarossa — is familiar to us. Frederick gave Ger- 
many a good and strong government, and gained a sure place 
in the affections of the German people, who came to regard him 
as the representative of the sentiment of German nationality. 
Other emperors, when engaged in contentions with the Pope, 
always had a great many among their own German subjects ready 
to join the Roman see against their own sovereign; but all classes 
in Germ.any rallied about their beloved Frederick. When news 
of his death was brought back from the East (sec. 146) they 
refused to believe that their " knightly Emperor " was dead, and, 
as time passed, a legend arose which told how he slept in a 
cavern beneath one of his castles on a mountain top, and how, 
when the ravens should cease to circle about the hill, he would 
appear, to make the German people a nation united and strong. 

Frederick Barbarossa was followed by his son Henry VI (1190- 
1197), who, by marriage, had acquired a claim to the kingdom 
of Sicily." Almost all his time and resources were spent in 

17 See sec. 112. The Hohenstaufen held the kingdom until 1265, when the Pope 
gave it as a fief to Charles 1 of Anjou (brother of Louis IX of France). Charles' 
oppressive rule led to a revolt of his island subjects, and to the great massacre known 
as the Sicilian Vespers (1282), one of the great tragedies of history. All the hated 
race of Frenchmen were either killed or driven out of the island. 



236 



GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 



attempts to reduce that remote realm to a state of proper sub- 
jection to his authority. By leading the emperors to neglect their 
German subjects and interests, this southern kingdom proved a 
fatal dower to the Suabian house. 

By the close of the Hohenstauf en period Germany was divided 
into about three hundred virtually independent states, the princes 
and the cities having taken advantage of the prolonged absences 
of the emperors, or their troubles with the popes and the Italian 
cities, to free themselves almost completely from the control of 
the crown. There was really no longer either a German Kingdom 
or a Holy Roman Empire. The royal as well as the imperial title 
had become an empty name. 

256. The Seven Electors; the Interregnum (125 4-1 2 7 3). — In 
order to make intelligible the transactions of that period in German 
history known as the Interregnum, which we have now reached, 
we must here say a word about the Electors of the Empire. . 










Fig. 45. — The Electors' Seat. (From a photograph) 

This structure stands on the banks of the Rhine near Coblenz. On the top are 
stone seats where the Electors met to elect the German king. The building . 
shown is an eighteenth-century restoration 

When, in the beginning of the tenth century, the German 
Carolingian line became extinct, the great nobles of the king- 
dom assumed the right of choosing the successor of the last of 
the house, and Germany thus became an elective feudal mon- 
archy. In the course of time a few of the leading nobles usurped 



THE INTERREGNUM 



237 



the right of choosing the king, and these princes became known 
as Electors. There were at the end of the Hohenstaufen period 
seven princes who enjoyed this important privilege, four of whom 
were secular princes and three spiritual. This electoral body 
really held the destinies of Germany in its hands.^^ 

We are now in a position to understand the shameful trans- 
action of the sale of the German crown. The Electors, like 
the pretorians of ancient Rome, put up the bauble for sale. 
There were two bidders, both foreigners, Richard of Cornwall, 
brother of the English king, Henry III, aaid Alphonso, king of 
Castile. Both candidates offered the Electors large bribes, and 
so both were elected, — one of the Electors voting for both can- 
didates. Although Alphonso had manifested so much anxiety to 
secure the honor, he never once set foot within the limits of 
Germany, and Richard contented himself with an occasional 
visit to the country. 

Of course neither of the emperors-elect possessed any real 
authority in Germany or in any of the countries claimed as parts 
of the Empire. The period is known in German history as the 
Interregnum. Anarchy prevailed throughout the country. Princes 
made themselves petty despots in their dominions, while the lesser 
nobles became robbers and preyed upon traders. 

257. Towns and Free Imperial Cities. — The kingly power 
having fallen into such utter contempt that all general govern- 
ment was practically in abeyance, the towns found it necessary, 
in order to protect themselves against the violence and oppres- 
sion of the princes and barons, to form confederations and take 
their defense in their own hands. It was during this anarchical 
period that the Hanseatic League (sec. 185) grew rapidly in 
strength and influence. 

18 The claims of the Electors were very naturally disputed by some of the other 
members of the Germanic body. In order to settle the matter forever, the Luxem- 
burg Emperor Charles IV (1347-1378), having first secured the action of a Diet, 
promulgated a decree called, from its golden seal, the Golden Bull, which confirmed 
the right of election in the princes who then exercised it, and defined clearly the 
powers and privileges of the electoral college. This bull remained the fundamental 
law of the German constitution so long as the Empire lasted, — until 1806. 



238. GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

During the course of the thirteenth century many of the towns, 
through the favor of their suzerain, were relieved of the presence 
of the imperial officers and became what are known as free 
imperial cities. They of course still acknowledged the suzerainty 
of the Emperor, but were allowed to manage their local affairs to 
suit themselves, and thus became practically little commonwealths, 
somewhat like the city-republics of Italy. 

A century or two after these cities had secured freedom from 
the imperial superintendence they acquired the right of repre- 
sentation in the Diet, or national legislative body. This was the 
natural consequence of their growing power, just as in England 
the increasing weight of the towns led, in the thirteenth century, 
to the admission of their representatives to Parliament. 

258. Rise of the Swiss Republic. — The most noteworthy 
matters in German history during the fourteenth and fifteenth 
centuries are the struggle between the Swiss and the princes of 
the Hapsburg or Austrian family, the religious movement of the 
Hussites, and the growing power of the House of Hapsburg. 

Embraced within the limits of the medieval Empire was the 
country now known as Switzerland. Its liberty-loving people 
yielded to the Emperor a nominal obedience, like that of the 
free imperial cities ; but they were very impatient of the claims 
of various feudal lords to political rights and authority over 
them. 

Among the lords claiming or actually possessing rights over 
different cantons or communities were the counts of Hapsburg.^^ 
The efforts of the Hapsburgs to bring the mountaineers wholly 
under their direct power led the three so-called Forest Cantons, 
Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden, to form a defensive union, known 
as the Everlasting Compact (1291). This league laid the basis 
of the Swiss Confederation, one of the most typical and interest- 
ing of the federal states of to-day. 



19 So called from the castle of Hapsburg, in Switzerland, the cradle of the house. 
In 1273 Count Rudolph of Hapsburg was chosen Emperor. A little later he acquired 
Austria as an appanage for his house. From this new possession the family took a 
new title, — that of the House of 'Austria. 



THE HUSSITES 239 

The struggle between the brave hillsmen and the House of Haps- 
burg was long and memorable. ^"^ EmbelHshed by Swiss patriotism 
with thrilling tales of heroic daring and self-devotion, the history 
of this contest reads like an Iliad. But modern historical criticism 
has reduced much of the story to prose. Thus the tale of the 
hero-patriot William Tell and of the tyrant Gessler we now know 
to be a myth, with nothing but the revolt as the nucleus of fact. 

Just at the close of the Middle Ages (in 1499) the Hapsburg 
Emperor Maximilian I, having been defeated in a war with the 
league, concluded with it a treaty which practically estabhshed 
the independence of the Swiss Confederation, and gave it a place 
in the family of European states. 

One effect upon the Swiss of their long struggle for liberty was 
the fostering among them of such a love for the military life that 
when, at a later period, there was lack of warlike occupation for 
them at home, the Swiss soldiers hired themselves out to the 
different sovereigns of Europe ; and thus it happened that, though 
trained in the school of freedom, these sturdy mountaineers 
became the most noted mercenary supporters of despotism. 

259. The Hussites. — About the beginning of the fifteenth cen- 
tury, through the medium of the university connections between 
England and Germany, the doctrines of the English reformer 
Wycliffe began to spread in Bohemia. The chief of the new sect 
was John Huss, a professor of the University of Prague. The 
doctrines of the reformer were condemned by the great Council 
of Constance, and Huss himself, having been delivered over into 
the hand? of the civil authorities for punishment, was burned at 
the stake (141 5). The following year Jerome of Prague, another 
reformer, was likewise burned. 

, Shortly after the burning of Huss a crusade was proclaimed 
against his followers, who had risen in arms. Then began a cruel, 

20 Noteworthy battles, all victories for the Swiss, were the battle of Morgarten 
(1315), the battle of Sempach (1386), and the battle of Nafels (1388). It was at 
Sempach, as a patriotic myth relates, that Arnold of Winkelried broke the ranks of 
the Austrians by collecting in his arms as many of their lances as he could, and, as 
they pierced his breast, bearing them with him to the ground, exclaiming, " Comrades, 
I will open a road for you." 



240 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

desolating war of fifteen years, the outcome of which was the 
almost total extermination of the radical party among the Hussites. 

260. The Imperial Crown becomes Hereditary in the House of 
Austria (1438). — In the year 1438 Albert, Duke of Austria, 
was raised by the Electors to the imperial throne. His accession 
marks an epoch in German history, for, from this time on until 
the dissolution of the Empire by Napoleon in 1806, the imperial 
crown was practically hereditary in the Hapsburg family, the 
Electors, although never faihng to go through the formality of an 
election, always choosing a person of Hapsburg descent.^^ 

261. The Reign of Maximilian L — The greatest of the Haps- 
burg line during the mediaeval period was Maximilian I (1493— 
15 19). The most noteworthy matter of his reign was the efforts 
made for constitutional reforms which should enable Germany to 
secure that internal peace and national unity which France, 
England, and Spain had each already in a fair degree attained. 

The condition of Germany at this time was somewhat similar 
to that of our Union under the Articles of Confederation. 
The need of a firmer union was recognized. One way of reach- 
ing this end was to invest the Emperor with greater authority; 
but the Electors and princes would not give up any part of their 
privileges and power. "To expect help from the princes," said 
despairingly a friend of the Emperor, " is Hke looking for grapes 
from thistles." 

Working under such untoward circumstances Maximihan, 
although he had large and ambitious plans for the Empire, 
accompHshed but httle. On -several sides the Empire was 
shorn of territory; within, brigandage was rife. The Emperor's 
pathetic words, " Earth possesses no joy for me ; alas, poor land 
of Germany ! " vividly reveal to us the hopeless condition of the 
" Fatherland " as the Middle Ages were closing. 

21 There was one exception; Francis I (of Lorraine), 1747-1765, was chosen as 
the husband of the Hapsburg queen, Maria Theresa. 



THE NIBELUNGENLIED 241 

Beginnings of German Literature 

262 . The Nibelungenlied. — It was during the rule of the 
Hohenstaufen that Germany produced the first pieces of a national 
hterature. The Nibelungenlied, or the " Lay of the Nibelungs," is 
the great German mediaeval epic It was reduced to writing about 
1200, being a recast, by some Homeric genius perhaps, of ancient 
German legends and lays dating from the sixth and seventh cen- 
turies. The hero of the story is Siegfried, the Achilles of Teutonic 
legend and song. The names and deeds of Attila, Theodoric, and 
other warriors of the age of the Wanderings of the Nations are 
mingled in its lines. 

This great national epic romance may be likened to the poem 
Beowulf oi our Saxon ancestors (sec. 22). It is gross and brutal, 
filled with fierce fightings and horrible slaughters, — a reflection 
of the rude times that gave birth to the original ballads out of 
which the epic was woven ; but there are also embodied in it the 
feudal virtues of loyalty and courage, while it further bears traces 
of the later softening influences of Christianity and of chivalry. 

263. The Minnesingers. — Under the same emperors, during 
the tweKth and thirteenth centuries, the Minnesingers, the poets 
of love, as the word signifies, flourished. They were the " Trou- 
badours of Germany." The most eminent of the Minnesingers 
was Walther von der Vogelweide (11 70— 1227), to whom we are 
indebted for the epigram, "Woman is women's fairest name, 
and honors them more than Lady." Many of the love songs of 
these minstrels were refined and chivalrous and pure, and thus 
tended to soften the manners and hft the hearts of the German 
people. 

Closely connected with the lyric poetry of the Minnesingers 
is a species of chivalric romances known as court epics. The 
finest of these pieces have for their groundwork the mythic 
Celtic-French legends of the Holy Grail and of the Knights of 
King Arthur's Round Table. The best representative of these 
romances is the poem of Parsifal?'^ The moral and spiritual 
22 By Wolfram of Eschenbach (d. about 1220). 



242 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

teaching of the poem is that only through humility, purity, and 
human sympathy can the soul attain unto the highest perfection 
of which it is capable. 

Just at the close of the Middle Ages the humanistic studies 
(sec. 280) came to interest the scholars of Germany. The result 
was that for three hundred years thereafter much of the best 
literary work of the German scholars and writers was done in 
Latin, — the mother tongue being regarded by the younger or 
later humanists as plebeian and fit only for inferior composition, 
— and thus the development of the native literature was seriously 
checked. 

V. Russia 

264. The Beginnings of Russia. — We have already seen how, 
about the middle of the ninth century, the Swedish adventurer 
Rurik became the chief of some Slavonic and Finnish tribes 
dwelling on the shores of the Gulf of Finland, in the neighbor- 
hood of Novgorod, and there laid the foundation of what was 
destined to grow into one of the leading powers of Europe (sec. 
84). The state came to be known as Russia, from Ros^ the name 
of the Scandinavian settlers. The descendants of Rurik gradually 
extended their authority over adjoining tribes, until nearly all the 
northwestern Slavs were included in their growing dominions. 

265. The Mongol Invasion. — Before the end of the eleventh 
century the unity of the Russian state had been almost com- 
pletely destroyed. The monarchy became a loose confederacy 
of petty, jealous, and warring principalities. This state of things 
prepared the way for the overwhelming calamity which befell 
Russia in the thirteenth century. 

The misfortune to which we refer was the overrunning and con- 
quest of the country by the Tartar hordes of Jenghiz Khan and 
his successors (sec. 174). The barbarian conquerors inflicted the 
most horrible atrocities upon the unfortunate land, and for two 
hundred and fifty years held the Russian princes in a degrading 
bondage, forcing them to pay homage and tribute. This period is 
almost a perfect blank in Russian history. The misfortune delayed 



THE RISE OF MUSCOVY 



243 



for centuries the nationalization of the Slavonian peoples. It was 
just such a misfortune as a little later befell the Greeks and the 
other races of Southeastern Europe. 

266. The Rise of Muscovy ; Russia freed from the Mongols. — 
During this period of Tartar domination the state of Muscovy, 
so called from Moscow, its center and capital, gradually extended 
its dominions until it became easily the first among all the Sla- 
vonic states. In 1470 the prince of Moscow annexed Novgorod 




Russia and the Scandinavian Countries at the Close 
OF THE Middle Ages 



the Mighty to his dominions. This new Russian power now felt 
itself strong enough to throw oif the Tartar yoke. 

It was under Ivan the Great (1462-1505) that Russia, — now 
frequently called Muscovy from the fact that it had been reor- 
ganized with Moscow as a center, — after a terrible struggle, suc- 
ceeded in freeing itself from the hateful Tartar domination and 
began to assume the character of a well-consolidated monarchy. 
Thus by the end of the Middle Ages Russia had become a really 



244 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

great power; but she was as yet too completely hemmed in by 
hostile states to be able to make her influence felt in the affairs 
of Europe. 

VI. Italy 

267. No National Government. — In marked contrast to all 
those countries of which we have thus far spoken, unless we 
except Germany, Italy came to the close of the Middle Ages 
without a national or regular government. This is to be attribu- 
ted, as we have already learned, to a variety of causes, but in 
large part to that unfortunate rivalry between Pope and Emperor 
which resulted in dividing Italy into the two hostile camps of 
Guelph and Ghibelline. 

And yet the mediaeval period did not pass without attempts on 
the part of patriot spirits to effect some sort of political union 
among the different cities and states of the peninsula. The most 
noteworthy of these movements, and one which gave assurance, 
that the spark of patriotism which was in time to flame into an 
inextinguishable passion for national unity was kindling in the 
Italian heart, was that headed by the patriot-hero Rienzi in the 
fourteenth century. 

268. Rienzi, Tribune of Rome (1347). — During the greater 
part of the fourteenth century the seat of the papal see was at 
Avignon, beyond the Alps (sec. 169). Throughout this period of 
the " Babylonian Captivity," Rome, deprived of her natural 
guardians, was in a state of the greatest confusion. The nobles 
terrorized the country about the capital and kept the streets of 
the city itself in constant turmoil with their bitter feuds. 

In the midst of these disorders there appeared from among 
the lowest ranks of the people a deliverer in the person of one 
Nicola di Rienzi. With imagination all aflame from long study 
of the records and monuments of the freedom and the glories of 
ancient Rome, he conceived the magnificent idea of not only 
delivering the capital from the wretchedness of the prevaiUng 
anarchy but also of restoring the city to its former proud position 
as head of Italy and mistress of the world. 



RmNZl, TRIBUNE OF ROME 245 

Possessed of considerable talent and great eloquence, Rienzi 
easily incited the people to a revolt against the rule, or rather 
misrule, of the nobles, and succeeded in having himself, with the 
title of Tribune, placed at the head of a new government for 
Rome. In this position his power was virtually absolute. He 
forced the nobles into submission, and in a short time effected a 
most wonderful transformation in the city and surrounding coun- 
try. Order and security took the place of disorder and violence. 
The best days of repubhcan Rome seemed to have been sud- 
denly restored. The enthusiasm of the Roman populace knew 
no limits. The remarkable revolution drew the attention of all 
Italy, and of the world beyond the peninsula as well. 

Encouraged by the success that had thus far attended his 
schemes, Rienzi now began to concert measures for the union of all 
the principalities and commonwealths of Italy into a great republic, 
with Rome as its capital. He sent ambassadors throughout Italy 
to plead, at the courts of the princes and in the council chambers 
of the municipalities, the cause of Italian unity and freedom. 

The splendid dream of Rienzi was shared by other Italian 
patriots besides himself, among whom was the poet Petrarch, 
who was the friend and encourager of the plebeian tribune, and 
who "wished part in the glorious work and in the lofty fame." 
" Could passion have listened to reason," says Gibbon, *' could 
private welfare have yielded to the public weKare, the supreme 
tribunal and confederate unionof the Italian republic might have 
healed the intestine discord and closed the Alps against the 
barbarians of the North." 

But the moment for Italy's unification had not yet come. Not 
only were there hindrances to the national movement in the 
ambitions and passions of rival parties and classes, but there 
were still greater impediments in the character of the plebeian 
patriot himself. Rienzi proved to be an unworthy leader. His 
sudden elevation and surprising success completely turned his 
head, and he soon began to exhibit the most incredible vanity 
and weakness. The people withdrew from him their support; 
the Pope excommunicated him as a rebel and heretic ; and the 



246 



GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 



nobles rose against him. He was finally killed in a sudden 
uprising of the populace (1354). 

Thus vanished the dream of Rienzi and of Petrarch, of the 
hero and of the poet. Centuries of division, of shameful sub- 
jection to foreign princes, — French, Spanish, and Austrian, — 
of wars and suffering, were yet before the Italian people ere Rome 
should become the center of a free, orderly, and united Italy. 

269. The Five Great States. — The unification of Italy was 
impossible ; yet the later mediaeval time witnessed a movement 



~w 



^^pS ^ TYROL, ,,_„.-.^_^^ 



1 Duchy of Milan ^M 

2 Bepublic of Venice f^^ 

3 Kepublio of Florence ^^ 

4 Slates of the Church ^^ 
6 Kingdom of Aaples IMIill 




°L.^^"^^ / 



THE M-N.WOSrS. 



Italy about the Middle of the Fifteenth Century 



in the direction of the consolidation of the numerous petty states 
of the northern and central regions into larger ones. By the 
middle of the fifteenth century the greater part of the peninsula 



"THE PRINCE" OF MACHIAVELLI 247 

was gathered into five so-called Great States, — the duchy of 
Milan ^^ and the two nominal republics of Venice and Florence 
in the north, the States of the Church in Central Italy, and the 
old Kingdom of Naples in the south. 

The formation of these states and the establishment of a sort 
of balance of power between them hushed the savage quarrels of 
the individual cities and gave Italy finally a few years of compara- 
tive peace (1447— 1492). 

But these great states, like the smaller ones, were jealous of 
one another. It was their inability to act in concert that enabled 
the French king, Charles VIII, to march in such an extraordinary 
way from one end of the peninsula to the other (sec. 240). 
Thus was Italy again opened to the "barbarians" of the North. 
It was the beginning, as we have seen, of the foreign enslave- 
ment of the peninsula. For three centuries and more Italy was 
destined to be merely " a geographical expression." 

270. The Renaissance. — Though the Middle Ages closed in 
Italy without the rise there of a national government, still before 
the end of the period much had been done to create those com- 
mon ideals and sentiments upon which political unity can alone 
securely repose. 

Literature and art here performed the part that war did in 
other countries in arousing a national pride and spirit. The 
Renaissance, of which we shall tell in the following chapter, with 
its awakenings and achievements, did much towards creating 
among the Italians a common pride in race and country; and 
thus this splendid Kterary and artistic enthusiasm was the first 
step in a course of national development which was to lead the 
Italian people, in the fullness of time, to a common political life. 

Here, in connection with Italian Renaissance literature, a word 
will be in place respecting The Prince^ by the Florentine historian 
Machiavelli. In this remarkable book the writer, imbued with a 
deep patriotic sentiment, points out the way in which, in the midst 

23 Milan was in the hands of the, powerful family of the Visconti. The last of the 
house died in 1447, and was succeeded in 1450 by Francesco Sforza, the founder of 
the celebrated family of Sforza. 



248 GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

of the existing chaos, material and spiritual, Italy might be con- 
solidated into a great state, Hke England or France or Spain. 

The redeemer of Italy and the maker of the new state must be 
a strong despotic prince, who in the work must have no moral 
scruples whatever, but be ready to use all means, however cruel 
and unjust and wicked, which promised to further the end in 
view. After the prince had created a united Italy, then he must 
rule in righteousness as the representative of the people. 

The way in which Machiavelli instructs the prince to build up 
a state out of the broken-down institutions of the Middle Ages 
was, in truth, the very way in which the despots of his time in 
Italy had actually created their principalities ; but that he should 

have seriously advised any one 
to adopt their immoral state- 
craft soon raised against him and 
his teachings, especially in the 
North, a storm of protest and 
denunciation which has not yet 
subsided. Machiavelli found 
disciples enough, however, so 
that his work had a vast though 
malign influence in molding the 
political morality of the six- 
teenth and seventeenth cen- 
FiG. 46. — Savonarola. (After an ^^j-jgg^ 

engraving by Leonardo da Vinci ] Savonarola (145 2-1498). 

in Vienna Museum) ' , , . • j 

— A word must here be said 

respecting the Florentine monk and reformer Girolamo Savon- 
arola, who stands as the most noteworthy personage in Italy 
during the closing years of the mediaeval period. 

Savonarola was at once Roman censor and Hebrew prophet. 
His powerful preaching alarmed the conscience of the Florentines. 
At his suggestion the women brought their finery and ornaments, 
and others their beautiful works of art, and, piling them in great 
heaps in the streets of Florence, burned them as vanities. Savon- 
arola even urged that the government of Florence be made a 




THE UNION OF CALMAR 



249 



theocracy and Christ be proclaimed king. But finally the activity 
of his enemies brought about the reformer's downfall, and he was 
condemned to death, strangled, his body burned, and his ashes 
thrown into the Arno. 

Savonarola may be regarded as the last great mediaeval fore- 
runner of the reformers of the sixteenth century. Yet he must 
not be thought of as a reformer in the same sense that Luther, 
for instance, was. He was not a precursor of Protestantism. He 
stood firmly on CathoHc ground. He believed the Papacy to be 
a divine institution. He wished, it is true, to reform the Church, 
but he had no quarrel with its doctrines or its form of government. 

VII. The Northern Countries 

272. The Union of Calmar (1397). — -The great Scandinavian 
Exodus of the ninth and tenth centuries drained the Northern 
lands of some of the best elements of their population. For 
this reason these countries did not play. as prominent a part in 
mediaeval history as they probably would otherwise have done. 
The constant contentions between the nobihty and their sover- 
eigns were also another cause of internal weakness. 

In the year 1397, by what is known as the Union of Calmar, the 
three kingdoms of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden were united 
under Margaret of Denmark, " the Semiramis of the North." The 
treaty provided that each country should retain its constitution 
and make its own laws. But the treaty was violated, and though 
the friends of the measure had hoped much from it, it brought 
only jealousies, feuds, and wars. 

Thus the history of these Northern countries during the later 
mediaeval time presents nothing of primary interest which calls 
for narration here ; but early in the Modern Age we shall see 
Sweden developing rapidly as an independent monarchy and for 
a period playing an important part in European affairs. 

Selections from the Sources. — Lanier, The Boy's Froissart, being 
Sir John Froissart's Chronicles edited for boys. Read chaps. Ixxviii- 
Ixxxiv, on the battle of Poitiers and after. Aucassin and Nicolette (trans. 



250 . GROWTH OF THE NATIONS 

by Andrew Lang) ; this is the most exquisite love story, in prose and 
verse, preserved to us from the land and the age of the Troubadours. 
Henderson, Select Historical Documents, pp. 1-168. Old South Leaflets, 
No. 5, " Magna Charta." Kendall, Source-Book, chaps, v-vii. Colby, 
Selections, Extracts 22-52. Translations and Reprints, vol. ii, No. 5, 
"England in the Time of Wycliffe" (ed. by Edward P. Cheyney). 

Secondary Works. — (i) Works of a general character: Freeman, 
Historical Geography of Europe, 2 vols. (vol. ii consists of maps). GuizoT, 
History of Civilization in Europe, Lects. ix and xi. Wilson, The State ; 
has valuable chapters on the development of the governmental institu- 
tions of the leading states. Lodge, The Close of the Middle Ages, 127^- 
I4g4. Adams, Civilization during the Middle Ages, chap, xiii, "The 
Formation of France," and chap, xiv, " England and the Other States." 

(2) National histories : The Story of the Nations series contains con- 
venient volumes on each of the chief European states. Green, History 
of the English People, parts of vols, i and ii. Kitchin, History of France, 
vol. i. Henderson, History of Germany in the Middle Ages. Hassall, 
The French People. Hume, The Spanish People. Gardiner's, Coman and 
Kendall's, Montgomery's, Terry's, Andrew^s', and Cheyney's histo- 
ries of England and Duruy's History of France are excellent single-volume 
text-books. 

(3) Biographies and books on special topics : In the Epochs of Modern 
History and the Heroes of the Nations series are to be found sepa- 
rate volumes covering many of the matters, political and biographical, 
touched upon in the present chapter. Lowell, Joan of Arc. Trevel- 
YAN, England in the Age of Wycliffe ; furnishes the best account we 
possess of the Peasants' Revolt. Poole, Wycliffe and Movements for 
Reform. Gasquet, The Great Pestilence. Cheyney, An Introduction to 
the Industrial and Social History of England, chap, v, " The Black Death 
and the Peasants' Rebellion." For English constitutional matters the 
student should consult Stubbs', Taswell-Langmead's, Macy's, and Tay- 
lor's works. Smith, The Troubadours at Home ; the best work in our 
language on the subject with which it deals. Mrs. Oliphant, The Makers 
of Florence. Lea, A History of the Inquisition in the Middle Ages. KiRK, 
History of Charles the Bold ; a notable work. Prescott, History of the 
Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella. Irving, The Conquest of Granada. 
Kenyon, Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts. Gasquet, The Old 
English Bible and Other Essays. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Thomas Becket. 2. William Wallace 
of Scotland, 3. The Black Death. 4. Joan of Arc. 5. Character of 
Louis XI of France. 6. Charles the Bold of Burgundy. 7. The fall of 
Granada. 8. The Sicilian Vespers. 9. Savonarola. 



CHAPTER XVIII 
THE RENAISSANCE 

I. The Beginnings of the Renaissance 

273. The Renaissance defined. — By the term Renaissance 
("New Birth"), used in its narrower sense, is meant that new 
enthusiasm for classical literature, learning, and art which sprang 
up in Italy towards the close of the Middle Ages, and which 
during the course of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries gave 
a new culture to Europe.-^ 

Using the word in a somewhat broader sense, we may define 
the Renaissance as the reentrance into the world of that secular, 
inquiring, self-reliant spirit which characterized the life and cul- 
ture of classical antiquity. This is simply to say that under the 
influence of the intellectual revival the men of Western Europe 
came to think and feel, to look upon life and the outer world, 
as did the men of ancient Greece and Rome; and this again 
is merely to say that they ceased to think and feel as mediaeval 
men and began to think and feel as modem men. 

274. The Crusades in their Relation to the Renaissance. — 
Many agencies conspired to bring in the Renaissance. Among 
these were the Crusades. These long-sustained enterprises, as 
we pointed out in summarizing their effects (sec. 159), contrib- 
uted essentially to break the mental lethargy that had fallen upon 
the European mind, and to awaken in the nations of Western 
Europe the spirit of a new life. Before the Crusades closed, the 

1 By many writers the term is employed in a still narrower sense than this, being 
used to designate merely the revival of classical art; but this is to depreciate the 
most important phase of a many-sided development. The Renaissance was essen- 
tially an intellectual movement. It is this intellectual quality which gives it so large 
a place in universal history. 

251 



252 THE RENAISSANCE 

way of the Renaissance was already prepared. In every territory 
of human activity the paths along which advances were to be 
made by the men of coming generations had been marked out, 
and in many directions trodden by the eager feet of the pioneers 
of the new life and culture. 

275. The Development of Vernacular Literatures as an Expres- 
sion of the New Spirit. — The awakening of this new spirit in the 
Western nations is especially observable in the growth and devel- 
opment of their vernacular literatures. It was, speaking broadly, 
during and just after the crusading centuries that the native 
tongues of Europe found a voice, — began to form literatures of 
their own. We have in another place spoken of the formation 
and gradual growth of some of the most important of these 
languages (sec. 44). As soon as their forms became somewhat 
settled, then literature was possible, and all these speeches bud 
and blossom into song and romance. In Spain the epic poem 
of the Cid^ a reflection of Castihan chivalry, forms the beginning 
of Spanish literature ; in the south of France the Troubadours 
fill the land with the melody of their love songs ; in the north 
the Trouveurs recite the stirring romances of Charlemagne and 
his paladins, of King Arthur and the Holy Grail ; in Germany the 
harsh strains of the Nibelungenlied are followed by the softer notes 
of the Minnesingers; in Italy Dante sings his Divine Comedy 
in the pure mellifluous tongue of Tuscany, and creates a language 
for the Italian race; in England Chaucer writes his Canterbury 
Tales and completes the fusion of Saxon and Norman into the 
English tongue. 

This growth of native literatures foreshadowed the approach- 
ing Renaissance ; for there was in them a note of freedom, a note- 
of protest against mediaeval asceticism and ecclesiastical restraint. 
And at the same time that this Hterary development heralded the 
coming intellectual revival it hastened its advance ; for the light 
songs, tales, and romances of these vernacular literatures, unlike 
the learned productions of the Schoolmen, which were in Latin 
and addressed only to a limited class, appealed to the masses and 
thus stirred the universal mind and heart of Europe. 



DANTE AND THE RENAISSANCE 



253 



276. Town Life and Lay Culture. —The spirit of the new life was 
nourished especially by the air of the great cities. In speaking of 
mediseval town life we noticed how within the towns there was early 
developed a life like that of modern times. The atmosphere of these 
bustling, trafficking cities called into existence a practical com- 
mercial spirit, a many-sided, independent, secular life which in many 
respects was directly opposed to mediaeval teachings and ideals. 

This intellectual and social movement within the mediaeval 
towns, especially in the great city-republics of Italy, was related 
most intimately, as we shall see in a moment (sec. 279), to that 
great revival of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to which 
the term Renaissance is 
distinctively applied. 

277. Dante as a Fore- 
runner of the Renaissance. 
— ^Wehave already spoken 
the name of Dante, but 
the great place he holds 
in the intellectual history 
of the race requires that 
we should speak with some 
detail of the relation which 
he sustained to the age 
which, just as he appeared, 
was passing away, and to 
the new age which was 
then approaching. 

Dante Alighieri, "the 
fame of the Tuscan peo- 
ple," was born at Flor- 
ence in 1265. He was 
exiled by the Florentines 
in 1302, and at the courts 

of friends learned how hard a thing it is " to climb the stairway 
of a patron." He died at Ravenna in 132 1, and his tomb there 
is a place of pilgrimage to-day. 




Fig. 47, — Dante. (From a portrait by 
S. Tofanelli) 



254 THE RENAISSANCE 

It was during the years of his exile that Dante wrote his immor- . 
tal poem, the Commedia as named by himself, because of its 
happy ending; the Divina Commedia, or the " Divine Comedy," 
as called by his admirers. This poem has been called the " Epic 
of MedisevaHsm." It is an epitome of the hfe and thought of the 
Middle Ages. Dante's theology is the theology of the mediaeval 
Church ; his philosophy is the philosophy of the Schoolmen ; his 
science is the science of his time. 

But although Dante viewed the world from a standpoint which 
was essentially that of the mediaeval age which was passing away, 
still he was in a profound sense a prophet of the new age which 
was approaching, — a forerunner of the Renaissance. He was 
such in his feeling for classical antiquity. When he speaks lov- 
ingly of Vergil as his teacher and master, the one from whom he 
took the beautiful style that had done him honor, he reveals how 
he has come to look with other than mediaeval eyes upon the 
Augustan poet. His modern attitude towards Graeco-Roman cul- 
ture is further shown in his free use of the works of the classical 
writers ; the illustrative material of his great poem is drawn almost 
as largely from classical as from Hebrew and Christian sources. 
Again, in his self-reliant judgment, in his critical spirit, in his mental 
independence, Dante exhibits intellectual traits which we recog- 
nize as belonging rather to the modern than to the mediaeval man. 

278. The Fresh Stimulus from the Side of Classical Antiquity. 
— We have now reached the opening of the fourteenth century. 
Just at this t^me the intellectual progress of Europe received a 
tremendous impulse from the more perfect recovery of the ines- 
timable treasures of the civilization of Graeco-Roman antiquity. 
So far-reaching and transforming was the influence of the old 
world of culture upon the nations of Western Europe that the 
Renaissance, viewed as the transition from the mediaeval to the 
modern age, may properly be regarded as beginning with its dis- 
covery, or rediscovery, and the appropriation of its riches by the 
Italian scholars. In the following sections we shall try to give 
some account of this Renaissance movement in its earlier stages 
9.nd as it manifested itself in Italy. 



INCITING CAUSES OF THE MOVEMENT 255 



II. The Renaissance in Italy 

279. Inciting Causes of the Movement. — Just as the Refor- 
mation went forth from Germany and the PoUtical Revolution 
from France, so did the Renaissance go forth from Italy. And 
this was not an accident. The Renaissance had its real beginnings 
in Italy for the reason that all those agencies which were slowly 
transforming the mediaeval into the modern world were here more 
active and effective in their workings than elsewhere. 

Foremost among these agencies must be placed the influence 
of the Italian cities. We have already seen how city life was 
more perfectly developed in Italy than in the other countries of 
Western Europe. In the air of the great Italian city-republics 
there was nourished a strong, self-reliant, secular, myriad-sided 
life. It was a political, intellectual, and artistic life like that of 
the cities of ancient Greece. Florence, for example, became a 
second Athens, and in the eager air of that city individual talent 
and faculty were developed as of old in the atmosphere of the 
Attic capital. "In Florence," says Symonds, "had been pro- 
duced such glorious human beings as the world has rarely seen. 
. . . The whole population formed an aristocracy of genius." 

In a word, life in Italy earlier than elsewhere lost its mediaeval 
characteristics and assumed those of the modern type. We may 
truly say that the Renaissance was cradled in the cities of mediaeval 
Italy. The Italians, to use again the words of Symonds, were " the 
firstborn among the sons of modern Europe." 

A second circumstance that doubtless contributed to make 
Italy the birthplace of the Renaissance was the fact that in Italy 
the break between the old and the new civilization was not so 
complete as it was in the other countries of Western Europe. 
The Italians were closer in language and in blood to the old 
Romans than were the other new-forming nations. They regarded 
themselves as the direct descendants and heirs of the old con- 
querors of the world. This consciousness of kinship with the men 
of a great past exerted an immense influence upon the imagination 
of the Italians and tended not only to preserve the continuity of 



256 THE RENAISSANCE 

the historical development in the peninsula but also to set as the 
first task of the Italian scholars the recovery and appropriation 
of the culture of antiquity. 

But more potent than all other agencies, not so much in awak- 
ening the Italian intellect as in determining the direction of its 
activities after they were once aroused by other inciting causes, 
was the existence in the peninsula of so many monuments of the 
civilization and the grandeur of ancient Rome. The cities them- 
selves were, in a very exact sense, fragments of the old Empire ; 
and everywhere in the peninsula the ground was covered with 
ruins of the old Roman builders. The influence which these 
reminders of a glorious past exerted upon sensitive souls is well 
illustrated by the biographies of such men as Rienzi and Petrarch. 

280. The Two Phases of the Italian Renaissance. — It was, as 
we have already intimated, the nearness of the Italians to the 
classical past that caused the Renaissance in Italy to assume 
essentially the character of a classical revival, — a recovery and 
appropriation by the Italians of the long-neglected heritage of 
Graeco-Roman civilization. 

The movement here consisted of two distinct yet closely related 
phases, namely, the revival of classical literature and learning, 
and the revival of classical art. It is with the first only, the intel- 
lectual and literary phase of the movement, that we shall be chiefly 
concerned. This feature of the movement is called distinctively 
"Humanism," and the promoters of it are known as "Human- 
ists," because of their interest in the study of the classics, the liter ce. 
humaniores, or the "more human letters," in opposition to the 
diviner letters, that is, theology, which made up the old education. 

281. Petrarch,^ the First of the Humanists. — "Not only in 
the history of Itahan literature but in that of the civilized world, 
and not only in this but in the history of the human mind . . . 
Petrarch's name shines as a star of the first magnitude." ^ 

2 Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374), Petrarch is best known to most as the writer 
of Italian sonnets, but his significance for general history is due almost wholly to his 
relation to the revival of classic learning in Italy, and consequently it is only of this 
phase of his activity that we shall speak. 

8 Voigt, Die Wiederbelebung des classischen Alterthums, 3d ed., vol. i, p. 22. 



PETRARCH, THE FIRST HUMANIST 



257 



It is in such words as these that one of the greatest historians 
of humanism speaks of Petrarch and his place in the history of the 
intellectual progress of the race. It will be worth our while to try- 
to understand what Petrarch was in himself and what he did which 
justifies such an appraisement of his significance for universal his- 
tory. To understand Petrarch is to understand the Renaissance. 

Petrarch was the first and greatest representative of the human- 
istic phase of the Italian Renaissance. He was the first scholar of 
the mediaeval time who 
fully realized and ap- 
preciated the supreme 
excellence and beauty 
of the classical literature 
and its value as a means 
of culture. His enthu- 
siasm for the ancient 
writers was a sort of wor- 
ship. At great cost of 
time and labor he made 
a collection of about 
two hundred manuscript 
volumes of the classics. 
Among his choicest 
Latin treasures were 
some of Cicero's letters, 
which he had himself 
discovered in an old 
library at Verona, and 
reverently copied with 
his own hand. He could not read Greek, yet he gathered Greek as 
well as Latin manuscripts. He had sixteen works of Plato and a 
revered copy of Homer sent him from Constantinople ; and thus, 
as he himself expressed it, the first of poets and the first of phi- 
losophers took up their abode with him. 

This last sentiment reveals Petrarch's feeling for his books. 
The spirits of their authors seemed to him to surround him in 




Fig. 48.- 



Petrarch. (From a portrait 
by S. Tofanelli) 



258 THE RENAISSANCE 

his quiet library, and he was never so happy as when holding 
converse with these choice souls of the past. Often he wrote 
letters to the old worthies, — Homer, Cicero, Vergil, Seneca, and 
the rest, — for Petrarch loved thus to record his thoughts, and 
spent much of his time in the recreation of letter writing; for 
recreation, and life itself, letter writing was to him. 

Petrarch's enthusiasm for the classical authors became conta- 
gious. Fathers reproached him for enticing their sons from the 
study of the law to the reading of the classics and the writing of 
Latin verses. But the movement started by Petrarch could not be 
checked. The impulse he imparted to humanistic studies is still 
felt in the world of letters and learning. 

282. Petrarch's Feeling for the Ruins of Rome. — Petrarch had 
for the material monuments of classical antiquity a feeling akin to 
that which he had for its literary memorials. 

The men of the real mediaeval time had no intelligent curiosity 
or feeling respecting the monuments and ruins of the ancient 
world. Their attitude towards all these things was exactly the 
same as that of the modern Arabs and Turks towards the remains 
of past civilizations in the lands of the Orient. To these degen- 
erate successors of masterful races the ruins of Nineveh and Baby- 
lon are convenient brick quarries, and nothing more. They are 
absolutely indifferent respecting all that great past to which these 
vast ruins bear silent and melancholy witness. How different is 
it with us, children of the Renaissance, as we dig in those same 
mounds, carefully and reverently gathering up every fragment of 
lettered stone or brick that may tell us something of the thoughts 
and feelings and deeds of those men of the early time ! 

All this illustrates perfectly the difference between the mediae- 
val man and the man of the Renaissance. During all the mediaeval 
centuries, until the dawn of the intellectual revival, the ruins of 
Rome were merely a quarry. The monuments of the Caesars 
were torn down for building material, the sculptured marbles 
were burned into lime for mortar. 

Now, Petrarch was one of the first men of mediaeval times who 
had for the ruins of Rome the modem feeling. " He tells us how 



BOCCACCIO, THE DISCIPLE OF PETRARCH 259 

often with Giovanni Colonna he ascended the mighty vaults of 
the Baths of Diocletian, and there in the transparent air, amid 
the wide silence, with the broad panorama stretching far around 
them, they spoke, not of business, or political affairs, but of the 
history which the ruins beneath their feet suggested." * 

283. Boccaccio, the Disciple of Petrarch. — Petrarch called into 
existence a school of ardent young humanists who looked up to 
him as their master, and who carried on with unbounded enthusi- 
asm the work of exploring the new spiritual hemisphere which he 
had discovered. Most distinguished among these disciples was 
Boccaccio (13 13-1375), whose wide fame rests chiefly on his 
Decameron, a collection of tales written in Italian, but whose work 
as a humanist alone has interest for us in the present connection. 

Boccaccio did much to spread and to deepen the enthusiasm 
for antiquity that Petrarch had awakened. He industriously col- 
lected and copied ancient manuscripts and thus greatly promoted 
classical scholarship in Italy. Imitating Petrarch, he tried to 
learn Greek, but, like Petrarch, made very Httle progress towards 
the mastery of the language because of the incompetence of his 
teacher and also because of the utter lack of text-books, gram- 
mars, and dictionaries. He persuaded his teacher, however, to 
make a Latin translation of the Iliad and the Odyssey^ and was 
thus instrumental in giving to the world the first modern trans- 
lation of Homer. It was a wretched version, yet it served to 
inspire in the Italian scholars an intense desire to know at first 
hand Greek literature, — that literature from which the old Roman 
authors had admittedly drawn their inspiration. 



4 Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, p. 177. Petrarch 
represents still other phases and qualities of the modern spirit, upon which, however, 
it is impossiljje for us to dwell. Regarding his feeling for nature in her grand and 
romantic aspects, we must nevertheless say a single word. One of the most remark- 
able passages in his writings is his description of his ascent of Mount Ventoux, near 
Avignon, for the sake of the view from the top. This was the beginning of the 
mountain climbing of modern times, — a new thing in the world. There was very 
little of it in antiquity, and during the Middle Ages apparently none at all. Even 
Dante always speaks of the mountains with a shudder. Nothing distinguishes the 
modern from the mediaeval man more sharply than this new feeling for nature in hw 
wilder and grander moods. 



260 THE RENAISSANCE 

2 84 . The Italians are taught Greek by Chrysoloras. —This desire 
of the Itahan scholars was soon gratified. Just at the close of the 
fourteenth century the Eastern Emperor sent an embassy to Italy 
to beg aid against the Turks. The commission was headed by 
Manuel Chrysoloras, an eminent Greek scholar. No sooner had 
he landed at Venice than the Florentines sent him a pressing 
invitation to come to their city. He acceded to their request, 
was received by them with such honor as they might have shown a 
celestial being, and was given a professor's chair in the university 
(1396). Young and old thronged his class room. Men past sixty 
"felt the blood leap in their veins" at the thought of being able 
to learn Greek. 

The appearance of Chrysoloras as a teacher at Florence marks 
the revival, after seven centuries of neglect, of the study of the 
Greek language and literature in the schools of Western Europe. 
This meant much. It meant the revival of civilization, the opening 
of the modem age ; for of all the agencies concerned in trans- 
forming the mediaeval into the modern world one of the most 
potent certainly was Greek culture.^ 

285. The Search for Old Manuscripts. — Having now spoken of 
the pioneers of Italian humanism in the fourteenth century, we 
can, in our remaining space, touch only in a very general way 
upon the most important phases of the humanistic movement in 
the following century. 

The first concern of the Italian scholars was to rescue from 
threatened oblivion what yet remained of the ancient classics. 
Just as the antiquarians of to-day dig over the mounds of Assyria 
for relics of the ancient civilization of the East, so did the 
humanists ransack the libraries of the monasteries and cathe- 
drals and search through all the out-of-the-way places of Europe 
for old manuscripts of the classic writers. 

The precious manuscripts were often discovered in a shameful 
state of neglect and in advanced stages of decay. Sometimes 

5 " If it be true [as has been asserted] that except the blind forces of nature noth- 
ing moves in this world which is not Greek in its origin, we are justified in regarding 
the point of contact between the Greek teacher Chrysoloras and his Florentine pupils 
as one of the most momentous crises in the history of civilization." — Symonds 



PATRONS OF THE NEW LEARNING 26j 

they were found covered with mold in damp cells or loaded with 
dust in the attics of monasteries. Again they were discovered, as 
by Boccaccio in the manuscript room of the Benedictine mon- 
astery of Monte Cassino, mutilated in various ways, some, for 
instance, with the borders of the parchment pared away, and 
others with whole leaves lacking.® 

This late search of the humanists for the works of the ancient 
authors saved to the world many precious manuscripts which, a 
little longer neglected, would have been forever lost. 

286. Patrons of the New Learning ; the Founding of Libraries. 
— This gathering and copying of the ancient manuscripts was 
costly in time and labor. But there was many a Maecenas to 
encourage and further the work. Merchant princes, despots, and 
popes became generous patrons of the humanists. Prominent 
among these promoters of the New Learning, as it was called, 
were Cosimo and Lorenzo de' Medici at Florence. It was largely 
due to their genuine and enlightened interest in the great under- 
taking of recovering for culture the ancient classical literatures 
that Florence became the foster home of the intellectual and 
literary revival. 

Among the papal promoters of the movement Pope Nicholas V 
(1447— 1455) was one of the most noted. He sent out explorers 
to all parts of the West to search for manuscripts, and kept busy 
at Rome a multitude of copyists and translators. A httle later 
Pope Julius II (1503— 15 13) and Pope Leo X (1513— 1521) made 
Rome a brilliant center of Renaissance art and learning. 

Libraries were founded where the new treasures might be safely 
stored and made accessible to scholars. In this movement some 
of the largest libraries of Italy had their beginnings. At Florence 
the Medici established the fine existing Medicean Library. At 
Rome Pope Nicholas V enriched the original papal collection of 

6 This mutilation was due chiefly to the scarcity of writing material, which led 
the mediaeval copyists to erase the original text of old parchments that they might 
use them a second time. In this way many works of classical authors were destroyed. 
Sometimes, however, the earlier text was so imperfectly obliterated that by means of 
chemical reagents it can be wholly or partially restored. Such twice-written manu- 
scripts are called palimpsests. 



262 THE RENAISSANCE 

books by the addition, it is said, of fully five thousand manu- 
scripts, and thus became the real founder of the celebrated 
Vatican Library of the present day. 

287. How the Fall of Constantinople aided the Revival The 

humanistic movement, especially in so far as it concerned Greek 
letters and learning, was given a great impulse by the disasters 
which in the fifteenth century befell the Eastern Empire. Con- 
stantinople, it will be recalled, was captured by the Ottoman 
Turks in 1453. But for a half century before that event the 
threatening advance of the barbarians had caused a great migra- 
tion of Greek scholars to the West. So many of the exiles sought 
an asylum in Italy that one could say : '' Greece has not fallen ; 
she has migrated to Italy, which in ancient times bore the name 
of Magna Graecia." 

These fugitives brought with them many valuable manuscripts 
of the ancient Greek classics still unknown to Western scholars. 
The enthusiasm of the Italians for everything Greek led to the 
appointment of many of the exiles as teachers and lecturers in 
their schools and universities. Thus there was now a repetition 
of what took place at Rome in the days of the later republic; 
Italy was conquered a second time by the genius of Greece. 

288. Translation and Criticism of the Classics. — The recovery 
of the ancient classics, their multiphcation by copyists, and their 
preservation in libraries was only the first and Hghtest part of the 
task which the Italian humanists set themselves. The most diffi- 
cult and significant part of their work lay in the comparison and 
correction of texts, the translation into Latin of the Greek manu- 
scripts, and the interpretation and criticism of the ancient 
literatures now recovered. 

Among the ItaHan scholars who devoted themselves to this 
work a foremost place must be assigned to PoUtian (145 4-1 494), 
a man of remarkable genius and learning. Almost all the noted 
humanists in Europe of his own and the following generation 
seem to have caught their inspiration in his lecture room."^ 

7 Another name of great renovm connected with these fifteenth-century labors of 
the Italian scholars is that of Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494), a man of extraordinary 



THE INVENTION OF PRINTING 



263 



289. The Invention of Printing. — During the latter part of the 

fifteenth century the work of the ItaHan humanists was greatly 
furthered by the happy and timely invention of the art of print- 
ing from movable letters, the most important discovery, in the 
estimation of Hallam, recorded in the annals of mankind. 

The making of impressions by means of engraved seals or 
blocks seems to be a device as old as civilization. The Chinese 
have practiced this form of printing from an early time. The art 
appears to have sprung up 



independently in Europe 
during the later mediaeval 
period. First, devices on 
playing cards were formed 
by impressions from 
blocks; then manuscripts 
were stamped with portraits 
and pictures. The next 
step was to cut into the 
same block a few lines of 
explanatory text. In time 
the lines increased to 
pages, and during the first 
half of the fifteenth cen- 
tury many entire books 
were produced by the 
block-printing method. 

But printing from blocks 
was slow and costly. The 
art was revolutionized by 




Fig. 49. — A Block-Printed Page 

FROM THE "BiBLIA PaUPERUM " 

(From Lacroix) 



John Gutenberg (1400-14 6 8), a native of Mainz in Germany, 
through the invention of the movable letters which we call type.* 
The oldest book known to have been printed from movable 

gifts of mind. The special task which Pico set for himself was the harmonizing of 
Christianity and the New Learning, a task like that of those scholars of the present 
time who seek to reconcile the Bible and modern science. 

8 Some Dutch writers claim for Coster of Haarlem the honor of the invention, but 
there is nothing aside from unreliable tradition on which such a claim can rest. 



264 



THE RENAISSANCE 



letters was a Latin copy of the Bible issued from the press of 
Gutenberg and Faust at Mainz between the years 1454 and 1456. 
The art spread rapidly and before the close of the fifteenth cen- 
tury presses were busy in every country of Europe — in the city 
of Venice alone there were two hundred — multiplying books with 
a rapidity undreamed of by the patient copyists of the cloister. 

290. The Aldine Press at Venice. — But it is merely the intro- 
duction of the new art into Italy that especially concerns us now. 




Fig. 50. — The Printing of Books. (From Early Venetian Printing) 



The little that our brief space will permit us to say on this subject 
gathers about the name of Aldus Manutius (1450-15 15), who 
established at Venice a celebrated printing house, known as the 
Aldine Press, the story of which forms one of the earliest and 
most interesting chapters in the history of the new art in its 
relation to humanism. 

In the course of a few years Aldus had given to the apprecia- 
tive scholars of Europe an almost complete series of the Greek 
authors. Besides these Greek editions he issued both Latin and 
Hebrew texts. Altogether he printed over a hundred works. In 



HUMANISM CROSSES THE ALPS 



265 



quality of paper and in clearness and beauty of type his editions 
have never been surpassed. 

The work of the Aldine Press at Venice, in connection of course 
with what was done by presses of less note in other places, made 
complete the recovery of the classical literatures, and by scattering 
broadcast throughout 
Europe the works of 
the ancient authors 
rendered it impossible 
that any part of them 
should ever again be- 
come lost to the world. 

291. Humanism 
crosses the Alps. — As 
early as the middle of 
the fifteenth century the 
German youths had be- 
gun to cross, the Alps in 
order to study Greek at 
the feet of the masters 
there. As the type and 
representative of these 
young German human- 
ists we may name 
Reuchlin, who in 1482 
journeyed to Italy and 
presented himself there 
before a celebrated 
teacher of Greek. As a 
test of his knowledge of 
the language he was given to translate a passage from Thucydides. 
The young barbarian — for by this term the Italians of that time 
expressed their contempt for an inhabitant of the rude North — 
turned the lines so easily and masterfully that the examiner, who 
was a native-born Greek, cried out in astonishment, " Our exiled 
Greece has flown beyond the Alps." 




Fig. 5] 



— Case of Chained Books. (From 
Clarke, The Care of Books) 

The case shown is preserved in the Chapter Library, 
Hertford, England. In some Hbraries this practice 
of chaining the books was kept up even in the 
eighteenth century 



266 THE RENAISSANCE 

In transalpine Europe the humanistic movement became 
blended with other tendencies. In Italy it had been an almost 
exclusive devotion to Greek and Latin letters and learning ; but 
in the North there was added to this enthusiasm for classical cul- 
ture an equal and indeed supreme interest in Hebrew and Chris- 
tian antiquity. Hence here the literary and intellectual revival 
became, in the profoundest sense, the moving cause of the great 
religious revolution known as the Reformation, and it is in con- 
nection with the beginnings of that movement that we shall find 
a place to speak of the humanists of Germany and the other 
northern lands. 

292. The Artistic Revival. — As we have already seen, the 
new feeling for classical antiquity awakened among the Italians 
embraced not simply the literary and philosophical side of the 
Graeco-Roman culture, but the artistic side as well. Respecting 
this latter phase of the Italian Renaissance it will be impossible 
for us to speak in detail, nor is it necessary for us to do so, since 
the chief significance of the Renaissance for universal history, as 
already noted, is to be sought in the purely intellectual movement 
traced in the preceding pages of this chapter. 

The artistic revival was in its essence a return of art to nature ; 
for mediaeval art lacked freedom and naturalness. The artist was 
hampered by ecclesiastical tradition and restraint ; he was, more- 
over, under the influence of the religious asceticism of the time. 
His models as a rule were the stiff, angular, lifeless forms of 
Byzantine art, or the gaunt, pinched bodies of saints and anchorites. 
In the decoration of the walls, pulpits, and altars of the churches 
he was not at liberty, even if he had the impulse, to depart from 
the consecrated traditional types.^ 

Now, what the Renaissance did for art was to liberate it from 
these trammels and to breathe into its dead forms the spirit of 
that new life which was everywhere awakening. This emancipa- 
tion movement took place largely under impulses which came 

9 In the Greek Church at the present time the artist in the portrayal of sacred 
subjects is not permitted to change the traditional expression or attitude of his 
figures. 



RENAISSANCE PAINTING 



267 



from a study of the masterpieces of ancient art. Thus did classical 
antiquity exercise the same influence in the emancipation and 
revival of art as in the emancipation and revival of letters.^*^ 

293. Why Painting was the Supreme Art of the Italian Renais- 
sance.^^ — The characteristic art of the Italian Renaissance was 
painting, and for the 
reason that it best 
expresses the ideas 
and sentiments of 
Christianity. The 
art that would be 
the handmaid of the 
Church needed to 
be able to represent 
faith and hope, 
ecstasy and suffer- 
ing, — none of which 
things can well be 
expressed by sculp- 
ture, which is 
essentially the art 
of repose. 

Sculpture was the chief art of the Greeks, because among them 
the aim of the artist was to represent physical beauty or strength. 
But the problem of the Christian artist is to express spiritual 
emotion or feeling through the medium of the body. This cannot 
be represented in cold, colorless marble. Thus, as Symonds asks, 
"How could the Last Judgment be expressed in plastic form? " 
The chief events of Christ's life removed him beyond the reach 
of sculpture. 




Fig. 52. — Tomb at Tours of the Children 
OF Charles VIII. (From a photogi^aph) 

Showing the influence of ancient classical art upon the 
art of the Renaissance 



10 In the list of Italian sculptors the following names are especially noteworthy : 
Ghiberti (1378-1455), whose genius is shown in his celebrated bronze gates of the 
Baptistery at Florence, of which Michael Angelo said that they were worthy to be the 
gates of Paradise; Brunelleschi (1377-1444), Donatello (1386-1466), and Michael 
Angelo (1475-1564). 

11 The views presented in this paragraph are those of Symonds in his work on 
The Fine Aris, which forms the third volume of his Renaissance in Italy. 



268 THE RENAISSANCE 

Therefore, because sculpture has so little power to express 
emotion, painting, which runs so easily the entire gamut of feel- 
ing, became the chosen medium of expression of the Italian artist. 
This art alone enabled him to portray the raptures of the saint, 
the sweet charm of the Madonna, the intense passion of the 
Christ, the moving terrors of the Last Judgment. 

294. The Four Masters ; Mingling of Christian and Classical 
Subjects. — The four supreme masters of Italian Renaissance 
painting were Leonardo da Vinci ^^ (1452-15 19), whose master- 
piece is his Last Supper, on the wall of a convent at Milan; 
Raphael (1483 -1520), the best beloved of artists, whose 
Madonnas are counted among the world's treasures; Michael 
Angelo^^ (1475-1564), whose best paintings are his wonderful 
frescoes, among them the Last Judgment, in the Sistine Chapel 
at Rome; and Titian ^^ (1477-1576), the Venetian master, cele- 
brated for his portraits, which have preserved for us in flesh and 
blood, so to speak, many of the most noteworthy personages of 
his time. 

The earUer Italian painters drew their subjects chiefly from 
Christian sources. They literally covered the walls of the 
churches, palaces, and civic buildings of Italy with pictorial rep- 
resentations of all the ideas and imaginings of the mediaeval ages 
respecting death, the judgment, heaven, and hell. As Symonds 
tersely expresses it, they did by means of pictures what Dante 
had done by means of poetry. 

The later artists, more under the influence of the classical 
revival, mingled freely pagan and Christian subjects and motives. 



12 Leonardo da Vinci was, in his many-sidedness and versatility, a true child of the 
Italian Renaissance ; he was at once painter, sculptor, architect, poet, musician, and 
scientist. 

13 Michael Angelo, as we have seen, was an architect and sculptor as well as 
a painter. He is the only modern sculptor who can be given a place alongside the 
greatest sculptors of ancient Greece. 

14 A longer list of the most eminent Italian painters would include at least the 
following names : Cimabue (about 1240-1302) and Giotto (12 76-1 33 7), precursors of 
the revival; Fra Angelico (i 387-1455) ; Correggio (about 1494-1534) ; Tintoretto 
(1518-1594) and Veronese (about 1530-1588), representatives of the Renaissance 
proper. 



PAGANISM OF THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE 269 

and thus became truer representatives than their predecessors of 
the Renaissance movement, one important issue of which was to be 
the reconciUation and blending of pagan and Christian culture. 

295. The Paganism of the Italian Renaissance. — There was a 
religious and moral, or, as usually expressed, an irrehgious and 
immoral, side to the classical revival in Italy which cannot be 
passed wholly unnoticed even in so brief an account of the move- 
ment as the present sketch. 

In the first place, the study of the pagan poets and philosophers 
produced the exact result predicted by a certain party in the 
Church. It proved hurtful to religious faith. Men became pagans 
in their feelings and in their way of thinking. Italian scholars 
and Italian society almost ceased to be Christian in any true 
sense of the word. 

With the New Learning came also those vices and immoralities 
that characterized the decline of classical civilization. Italy was 
corrupted by the new influences that flowed in upon her, just as 
Rome was corrupted by Grecian luxury and sensuality in the days 
of the failing republic. Much of the Hterature of the time is even 
more grossly immoral in tone than the literature of the age of 
classical decadence. 

III. General Effects of the Renaissance 

296. The Renaissance- brought in New Conceptions of Life and 
the World. — The Renaissance effected in the Christian West an 
intellectual and moral revolution so profound and so far-reaching 
in its consequences that it may well be likened to that produced 
in the ancient world by the incoming of Christianity. The New 
Learning was indeed a New Gospel. Like Christianity, the 
Renaissance revealed to men another world, another state of 
existence; for such was the real significance, to the men of the 
revival, of the discovery of the civilization of classical antiquity. 
Through this discovery they learned that this earthly life is worth 
living for its own sake ; that this life and its pleasures need not 
be contemned and sacrificed in order to make sure of eternal life in 



270 THE RENAISSANCE 

another world ; and that man may think and investigate and satisfy 
his thirst to know without endangering the welfare of his soul.^^ 

These discoveries made by the men of the Renaissance gave a 
vast impulse to the progress of the human race. They inspired 
humanity with a new spirit, a spirit destined in time to make 
things new in all realms, — in the realm of religion, of politics, of 
literature, of art, of science, of invention, of industry. Some of 
these changes and revolutions we shall briefly indicate in the 
remaining sections of this chapter. To follow them out more in 
detail in all the territories of human activity and achievement 
will be our aim in later chapters, where we propose to trace the 
course of the historical development through the centuries of the 
Modern Age, — the great age opened by the Renaissance. 

297. It restored the Broken Unity of History. — When Chris- 
tianity entered the ancient Graeco-Roman world war declared 
itself at once between the new religion and classical culture, 
especially between it and Hellenism. The Church, soon trium- 
phant over paganism, rejected the bequest of antiquity. Some 
of the elements of that heritage were, it is true, appropriated by 
the men of the mediaeval time and thus came to enrich the new 
Christian culture ; but, as a whole, it was cast aside as pagan, and 
neglected. Thus was the unity of the historical development broken. 

Now, through the liberal tendencies and generous enthusiasms 
of the Renaissance there was effected a reconciliation between 

15 The longings and the superstitious fears of men in the age of transition between 
mediaeval and modern times is well epitomized in the tradition of Dr. Faustus. 
" That legend," says Symonds, " tells us what the men upon the eve of the Reviyal 
longed for, and what they dreaded, when they turned their minds toward the past. 
The secret of enjoyment and the source of strength possessed by the ancients allured 
them ; but they believed that they could only recover this lost treasure by the suicide 
of the soul. So great was the temptation that Faustus paid the price. After imbib- 
ing all the knowledge of the age, he sold himself to the devil, in order that his thirst 
for experience might be quenched, his grasp upon the world be strengthened, and the 
ennui of his activity be soothed. His first use of his dearly-bought power was to 
make blind Homer sing to him. Amphion tunes his harp in concert with Mephis- 
topheles. Alexander rises from the dead at his behest, with all his legionaries ; and 
Helen is given to him for a bride. Faustus is therefore a parable of the impotent 
yearnings of the spirit in the Middle Ages, — its passionate aspiration, its conscience 
stricken desire, its fettered curiosity amid the cramping limits of impotent knowledge 
and irrational dogmatisms." — Revival of Learnings P- 53 (^d. 1888). 



IT REFORMED EDUCATION 271 

Christianity and classical civilization. There took place a fusion 
of their qualities and elements. The broken unity of history was 
restored. The cleft between the ancient and the modern world 
was closed. The severed branch was reunited to the old trunk. 

The importance for universal history of this restoration of its 
broken unity, of this recovery by the Modern Age of the long- 
neglected culture of antiquity, can hardly be overestimated ; for 
that culture had in its keeping not only the best the human race 
had thought and felt in the period of the highest reach of its 
powers, but also the precious scientific stores accumulated by all 
the ancient peoples. What the recovery and appropriation of all 
this meant for the world is suggested by ex-President Woolsey in 
these words : " The old civilization contained treasures of perma- 
nent value which the world could not spare, which the world will 
never be able or willing to spare. These were taken up into the 
stream of hfe, and proved true aids to the progress of a culture 
which is gathering in one the beauty and truth of all the ages." 

298. It reformed Education. — The humanistic revival revolu- 
tionized education. During the Middle Ages the Latin language 
had degenerated, for the most part, into a barbarous jargon, 
while the Greek had been forgotten and the Aristotelian philoso- 
phy perverted. As to Plato, he was practically unknown to the 
mediaeval thinkers. Now humanism restored to the world the pure 
classical Latin, rediscovered the Greek language, and recovered 
for civilization the once-rejected heritage of the ancient classics, 
including the Platonic philosophy, which was to be a quickening 
and uplifting force in modern thought. 

The schools and universities did not escape the influences of 
this humanistic revival. Chairs in both the Greek and Latin lan- 
guages and Hteratures were now established, not only in the new 
universities which arose under the inspiration of the New Learn- 
ing, but also in the old ones. The scholastic method of instruc- 
tion, of which we spoke in a preceding chapter, was gradually 
superseded by this so-called classical system of education, which 
dominated the schools and universities of the world down to the 
incoming of the scientific studies of the present day. 



2/2 THE RENAISSANCE 

299. It aided the Development of the Vernacular Literatures 

The classical revival gave to the world the treasures of .two great 
Hteratures. And in giving to the scholars of Europe the master- 
pieces of the ancient authors, it gave to them, besides much 
fresh material, the most faultless models of literary taste and 
judgment that the world has ever produced. The influence of 
these in correcting the extravagances of the mediaeval imagina- 
tion and in creating correct literary ideals can be distinctly traced 
in the native literatures of Italy, France, Spain, and England. 

It is sometimes maintained indeed that the attention given to 
the ancient classics, and the preferred use by so many authors 
during the later mediaeval and the earlier modern period of the 
Latin as a literary language,^® retarded the normal development 
of the vernacular literatures of the European peoples. As to 
Italy, it is true that the national literature which had started into 
life with such promise with Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio was 
for almost a century neglected ; but in transalpine Europe, apart 
from Germany, where for a period Latin did almost supplant the 
vernacular, the revived study of the classics did not produce the 
disastrous effects observed in Italy. On the contrary, as we have 
just said, the effect of humanism upon the great literatures of 
Europe, aside from the exceptions noticed, was to enrich, to 
chasten, and to refine them. 

300. It called into Existence the Sciences of Archaeology and 
Historical Criticism. — Many sciences were in germ in the Renais- 
sance. As to the science of archaeology, which possesses such a 
special interest for the historical student, it may be truly said 
that it had its birth in the classical revival. We have already 
noticed the new feeling for the remains of antiquity that stirred 
in the souls of the men of the Renaissance (sec. 282). 

The ruins of Rome were naturally the first object of the reverent 
curiosity and archaeological zeal of the Italian scholars. From the 
fifteenth century down to the present day the interest in the 
monuments and relics of past ages and civilization has steadily 

16 Some of the very best literary work of the period was done in Latin, as witness 
the Colloquies by Erasmus and the Utopia by More. 



THE SCIENCE OF ARCHAEOLOGY 273 

widened and deepened and has led to remarkable discoveries, not 
only on classical ground, but also in Hebrew, Assyrian, and 
Egyptian territories, — discoveries which, by carrying the story 
of the human race back into a past immensely remote, have given 
an entirely new beginning to history. 

What is true of the science of archaeology is equally true of the 
science of historical criticism. We have seen that the spirit which 
awoke in the Renaissance was a questioning, critical spirit, one 
very different from the credulous mediaeval spirit, which was 
ready to accept any picturesque tradition or marvelous tale with- 
out inquiry as to its source or credibility. It was this spirit that 
stirred in Petrarch. We find him comparing and criticising the 
classical authors and following only those whom he has reason to 
beUeve to be trustworthy. 

But the true founder of the science of historical criticism was 
Laurentius Valla (1407-145 7). His greatest achievement as a 
critic was the demonstration, on philological and historical 
grounds, of the unauthentic character of the celebrated Dona- 
tion of Constantine.^^ He also called in question the authority 
of Livy and proved the spurious character of the alleged corre- 
spondence between Seneca and the Apostle Paul. 

The achievements of Valla ushered in the day of historical 
criticism. Here began that critical sifting and valuation of our 
historical sources which has resulted in the discrediting of a thou- 
sand myths and legends once regarded as unimpeachable histori- 
cal material, and in the consequent reconstruction of Oriental, 
classical, and mediaeval history. 

301 . It gave an Impulse to Religious Reform. — The humanistic 
movement, as we have already noticed, when it crossed the Alps 
assumed among the northern peoples a new character. It was 
the Hebrew past rather than the Graeco-Roman past which stirred 
the interest of the scholars of the North. The Bible, which the 
printing presses were now multiplying in the original Hebrew and 
Greek as well as in the vernacular languages, became the subject 
of enthusiastic study and of fresh interpretation. Consequently 

17 See sec. 41, n. 15. 



274 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



what was in the South a restoration of classical literature and art 
became in the more serious and less sensuous North a revival of 
primitive Christianity, of the ethical and religious elements of the 
Hebrew-Christian past. The humanist became the reformer. 
Reuchlin, Erasmus, and the other humanists of the North were 
the true precursors of the great religious revolution of the six- 
teenth century. 

Selections from the Sources. — Robinson and Rolfe, Petrarch. This 
volume contains a selection from Petrarch's "correspondence with Boc- 
caccio and other friends, designed to illustrate the beginnings of the 
Renaissance." The student should begin his readings on this subject 
with this delightful book. Whitcomb, Source-Book of the Renaissance^ 
Part I. An excellent little book, which forms a good supplement to the 
preceding work. The part cited contains short extracts judiciously chosen 
from the writings of fourteen Italian writers of the age of the Renaissance. 
The Book of The Courtier (The Tudor Translations). This book is one 
of the most important and characteristic products of the Italian Renais- 
sance. It was translated into all the chief European languages and exerted 
a vast influence upon life and manners everywhere, and especially in Eng- 
land. " There is not the slightest reason for doubting," says Professor 
Saintsbury, " that Sidney himself had the Courtier and its ideal constantly 
before him." Robinson, Readings in European History^ vol. i, chap. xxii. 

Secondary Works. — The literature on the Renaissance is very exten- 
sive ; we shall suggest only a few titles. Symonds, The Renaissance in 
Italy; the best extended history in English. Burckhardt, The Civiliza- 
tion of the Renaissance in Italy ; the most philosophical and suggestive 
work on the subject. Mrs. Oliphant, Makers of Florence and Makers of 
Venice. Field, An Introduction to the Study of the Renaissance. Adams, 
Civilization during the Middle Ages, chap. xv. Munro and Sellery, 
Mediceval Civilization, pp. 277-309. Putnam, Books and their Makers 
during the Middle Ages, vol. i. Part II, "The Earlier Printed Books." 
Grimm, The Life of Michael Angelo. Armstrong, Lorenzo de* Medici 
and Florence in the Fifteenth Century. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Dante's life and his Divine Comedy. 
2. The ruins of Rome in mediaeval times. 3. Petrarch's ascent of Mount 
Ventoux. 4. Boccaccio as a collector of ancient manuscripts. 5. Chryso- 
loras, the Greek teacher. 6. The Aldine Press. 



Part II— The Modern Age 

THIRD PERIOD— THE ERA OF THE 
REFORMATION 

(From the Discovery of America, in 1492, to the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648) 

CHAPTER XIX 

GEOGRAPHICAL DISCOVERIES AND THE BEGINNINGS OF 
MODERN COLONIZATION 

302. Transition from the Mediaeval to the Modern Age. — The 

discovery of America by Columbus, in 1492, is often used to 
mark the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modern 
times ; and this was an event of such transcendent importance, — 
the effect upon civilization of the opening up of fresh continents 
was so great, — that we may very properly accord to the achieve- 
ment of the Genoese the honor proposed. Yet we must bear in 
mind that no single circumstance or event actually marks the end 
of the old order of things and the beginning of the new. The 
finding of the New World did not make the new age ; the new 
age discovered the New World. The undertaking of Columbus 
was the natural outcome of that spirit of commercial enterprise 
and scientific curiosity which for centuries — ever since the Cru- 
sades — had been gradually expanding the scope of mercantile 
adventure and broadening the horizon of the European world. 
His fortunate expedition was only one of several brilHant nautical 
exploits which distinguished the close of the fifteenth and the 
opening of the sixteenth century. 

275 



2^6 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

This same period was also marked by significant intellectual, 
political, and religious movements, which indicated that civiliza- 
tion was about to enter — indeed, had already entered — upon a 
new phase of its development. 

In the intellectual world, as we have seen, was going on the 
wonderful Revival of Learning, producing everywhere unwonted 
thought, stir, and enterprise.^ This intellectual movement alone 
would suffice to mark the period of which we speak as the begin- 
ning of a new historical era ; for the opening and the closing of 
the great epochs of history, such as the Age of Christianity, the 
Age of the Protestant Reformation, and the Age of the Political 
Revolution, are determined not by events or happenings in the 
outer world but by movements within the soul of humanity. 

In the political world the tendency to centralization which had 
long been at work in different countries of Europe, gathering up 
the little feudal units into larger aggregates, was culminating in 
the formation of great independent nations with strong monar- 
chical governments. The Age of the Nations was opening. This 
movement was one of vast significance in European history and 
might in itself very well be regarded as forming a division line 
between two great epochs. 

In the religious world there were unrest, dissatisfaction, inquiry, 
complaint, — premonitory symptoms of the tremendous revolution 
that was destined to render the sixteenth century memorable in 
the rehgious records of mankind. This upheaval also constitutes 
a sort of continental divide in history. 

1 The truest representative of the intellectual revival on its scientific side was 
Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543), who, while Columbus and others were exploring 
the earth's unknown seas and opening up a new hemisphere for civilization, was 
exploring the heavens and discovering the true system of the universe. He had quite 
fully matured his theory by the year 1507, but fearing the charge of heresy he did not 
publish the great work embodying his views until thirty-six years later (in 1543)- It 
should be carefully noted, however, that the Copernican theory had little influence on 
the thought of the sixteenth century. It was denounced as contrary to Scripture by 
both CathoHcs and Protestants, and was almost universally rejected for more than 
a hundred years after its first publication. Even after the revelations made by the 
telescope of Galileo (i 564-1642) the acceptance of the truth was so hindered by 
theological opposition that the complete triumph of the doctrine was delayed imtil 
the eighteenth century. See Andrew D. White, The Warfare of Science -with 
Theology^ vol. i, chap. iii. 



MARITIME EXPLORATIONS 



277 



Closely connected with these movements were three great 
inventions which, like the inventions of our own time (sec. 760), 
were also signs of a new age, and which powerfully helped on the 
mental and social revolutions. Thus the intellectual revival and 
the religious reform were greatly promoted by the new art of 
printing (sec. 289) ; the kings in their struggle with the nobles 
were materially aided by the use of gunpowder, which rendered 
useless costly armor and fortified castle and helped to 
replace the feudal levy by a regular standing army, 
the prop and bulwark of the royal power ; while the 
great ocean voyages of the times were rendered pos- 
sible only by the improvement of the mariner's com- 
pass,'^ whose trusty guidance emboldened the navigator 
to quit the shore and push out upon hitherto 
untraversed seas. 

303. Maritime Explorations ; the Terrors 
of the Ocean. — To appreciate the greatness 
of the achievements of the navigators and 
explorers of the age of geographical dis- 
covery, we need to bear in mind with what 
terrors the mediaeval imagination had in- 
vested the unknown regions of the earth. 
In the popular conception these parts were 
haunted by demons and dragons and mon- 
sters of every kind. The lands were shrouded 
in eternal mists and darkness. The seas were 
filled with awful whirlpools and treacherous 
currents, and shallowed into vast marshes. 
Out in the Atlantic, so a popular superstition taught, was the mouth 
of hell ; the red glow cast upon the sun at its setting was held 
to be positive evidence of this. Away to the south, under the 




Fig. 53. — A Chinese 
Magnet Figure 
(After Beazley) 

A rude form of the com- 
pass used by early 
Chinese sailors.2 The 
little wooden figure was 
set on a pivot, and in 
the outstretched arm 
was placed a bar of 
magnetized iron 



2 It is a disputed question as to what people should be given the credit of the dis- 
covery of the properties of the magnetic needle. In a very primitive form the compass 
was certainly in use among the Chinese as early as the eighth century of our era. 
There is no reliable record of its use by European navigators before about the middle 
of the thirteenth century. It seems most probable that a knowledge of the instrument 
was gained in the East by the crusaders. 



2/8 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

equator, there was believed to be an impassable belt of fire. This 
was a very persistent idea, and was not dispelled until men had 
actually sailed beyond the equatorial regions. 

304. Portuguese Explorations; Prince Henry the Navigator. — 
Many incentives concurred to urge daring navigators in the later 
mediaeval time to undertake voyages of discovery, but a chief 
motive was a desire to find a water way that should serve as a 
new trade route between Europe and the Indies. 

The first attempts to reach these lands by an all sea route 
were made by sailors feeling their way down the western coast of 
the African continent. The favorable situation of Portugal upon 
the Atlantic seaboard caused her to become foremost in these 
enterprises. Throughout the fifteenth century Portuguese sailors 
were year after year penetrating a little farther into the myste- 
rious tropical seas and uncovering new reaches of the western 
coast of Africa. The soul and inspiration of all this maritime 
enterprise was Prince Henry the Navigator (i 394-1460). 

In the year 1442 the Portuguese mariners reached the Gulf 
of Guinea, and here discovered the home of the true negro. 
Some of the ebony-skinned natives were carried to Portugal as 
slaves. This was the beginning of the modern African slave 
trade, which was destined to shape such large sections of the 
history of the centuries with which we have to do. The traffic 
was at first approved by even the most philanthropic persons, 
on the ground that the certain conversion of the slaves under 
Christian masters would more than compensate them for their 
loss of freedom. 

Finally, in i486, Bartholomew Dias succeeded in reaching 
the most southern point of the continent, which, as the possi- 
bility of reaching India by sea now seemed assured, was later 
given the name of Cape of Good Hope. But at the same time 
it was a disappointment to the Portuguese to find that Africa 
extended so far to the south. Even should India be reached, 
the way, it was now known, would be long and dangerous. This 
knowledge stimulated efforts to reach the Indies and the " place 
of spices " by a different and shorter route. 



COLUMBUS FINDS THE NEW WORLD 



279 



305. Columbus in Search of a Westward Route to the Indies 
finds the New World (1492). — It was Christopher Columbus, a 
Genoese by birth, who now proposed the bold plan of reaching 
these eastern lands by sailing westward. The sphericity of the 
earth was a doctrine held by all the really learned men of this 
time. This notion was also familiar to many at least of the com- 
mon people ; but they, while vaguely accepting the view that the 
earth is round, 
thought that the 
habitable part was a 
comparatively flat, 
shieldlike plain on 
the top of it. All the 
rest they thought to 
be covered by the 
waters of a great 
ocean. 

While agreed as to 
the globular form of 
the earth and of the 
curvature of the land 
as well as of the water 
surface, scholars dif- 
fered as to the pro- 
portion of land and 
water. The common 
opinion among them 
was that the greater part of the earth's surface was water. Some, 
however, believed that three fourths or more of its surface was land, 
and that only a narrow ocean separated the western shores of Europe 
from the eastern shores of Asia. Columbus held this latter view, 
and also shared with others a misconception as to the size of the 
earth, supposing it to be much smaller than it really is. Conse- 
quently he felt sure that a westward sail of three or four thousand 
miles would bring him to the Indies. Thus his very misconceptions 
fed his hopes and drew him on to his great discovery. 




Fig. 54. — Christopher Columbus. (After 
the Capriolo portrait; from the Columbus 
Memorial Volume) 



28o BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

Everybody knows how Columbus in his endeavors to secure 
a patron for his enterprise met at first with repeated repulse 
and disappointment; how at last he gained the ear of Queen 
Isabella of Castile ; how a fleet of three small vessels was fitted 
out for the explorer ; and how the New World was discovered, 
— or rather rediscovered (sec. 83). 

The return of Columbus to Spain with his vessels loaded with 
the strange animal and vegetable products of the new lands he 
had found, together with several specimens of the inhabitants, — 
a race of men new to Europeans, — produced the profoundest 
sensation among all classes. Curiosity was unbounded. The spirit 
of hazardous enterprise awakened by the surprising discovery led 
to those subsequent undertakings by Castilian adventurers which 
make up the most thrilling pages of Spanish history. 

Columbus made altogether four voyages to the new lands; 
still he died in ignorance of the fact that he had really discov- 
ered a new world. He supposed the land he had found to be 
some part of the Indies, whence the name "West Indies" which 
still clings to the islands between North and South America, and 
the term " Indians " applied to the aborigines. It was not until 
the middle of the sixteenth century that it became fully estab- 
lished that a great new double continent, separated from Asia by 
an ocean wider than the Atlantic, had been found. 

Columbus never received during his lifetime a fitting recog- 
nition of the unparalleled service he had rendered Spain and the 
world. Jealousy pursued him, and from his third voyage he was 
sent home loaded with chains. Even the continent he had dis- 
covered, instead of being called after him as a perpetual memo- 
rial, was named from a Florentine navigator, Amerigo Vespucci, 
whose chief claim to this distinction was his having written th« 
first widely published account of the new lands. 

306. The Voyage of Vasco da Gama (149 7-1 498); the Portu- 
guese create a Colonial Empire in the East. — We have seen that 
by the year i486 the Portuguese navigators, in their search for 
an ocean route to the Indies, had reached the southern point of 
Africa. A little later, six years after the first voyage of Columbus, 



THE PAPAL LINE OF DEMARCATION 281 

Vasco da Gama, a Portuguese admiral, doubled the Cape, crossed 
the Indian Ocean, and landed on the coast of Malabar. 

The discovery of an unbroken water path to India effected 
most important changes in the trade routes and traffic of the 
world. It made the port of Lisbon the depot of the Eastern 
trade. The merchants of Venice were ruined. The great ware- 
houses of Alexandria were left empty. The old route to the 
Indies by way of the Red Sea, which had been from time imme- 
morial a main line of communication between the Far East and 
the Mediterranean lands, now fell into disuse, not to be reopened 
until the construction of the Suez Canal in our own day. 

Portugal dotted the coasts of Africa and Asia, the Moluccas 
and other islands of the Pacific archipelago, with fortresses and 
factories, and built up in these parts a great commercial empire, 
and, through the extraordinary impulse thus given to the enter- 
prise and ambition of her citizens, now entered upon the most 
splendid era of her history.^ 

307. The Papal Line of Demarcation. — Remarkable and bold 
as were the voyages of Columbus and Vasco da Gama, these 
were now to be eclipsed by the still more adventurous enterprise 
of the circumnavigation of the globe by Ferdinand Magellan, a 
navigator of Portuguese birth. But to make intelligible the object 
of this expedition there is needed a word of explanation con- 
cerning what is known as the Papal Line of Demarcation. 

Upon the return of Columbus from his successful expedition. 
Pope Alexander VI, with a view to adjusting the conflicting 
claims of Spain and Portugal, issued a bull wherein he drew 
from pole to pole a line of demarcation through the Atlantic one 
hundred leagues west of the Azores* (the line was afterwards 
moved two hundred and seventy leagues westward ^), and awarded 

3 Among the makers of the Portuguese colonial empire Albuquerque (i452?-i5i5) 
stands preeminent. The story of his career possesses many elements of romance. 

4 As it was impossible for the surveyors and geometers to fix upon the right 
starting point, the indefiniteness of the language of the bull made no end of trouble. 
See Bourne's Essays in Historical Criticism, Essay vii. 

6 One result of this change was to throw the eastward projecting part of South 
America to the east of the demarcation line, and thus to make it a Portuguese instead 
of a Spanish possession. 



282 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

to the Spanish sovereigns all pagan lands, not already in posses- 
sion of Christian princes, that their subjects might find west of 
this line, and to the Portuguese kings all unclaimed pagan lands 
discovered by Portuguese navigators east of the designated merid- 
ian.® By treaty arrangements as well as by papal edicts, — which 
were based on the theory of that time that the ocean like the 
land might be appropriated by any power and absolute control 
over it asserted,^ — the Portuguese were prohibited from sailing 
any of the seas thus placed under the dominion of Spain or from 
visiting as traders any of her lands, and the Spaniards from tres- 
passing upon the waters or the lands granted to the Portuguese. 

Spain was thus shut out from the use of the Cape route to the 
Indies which had been opened up by Vasco da Gama, and con- 
sequently from participation in the coveted spice trade, unless 
perchance a way to the region of spices could be found through 
some opening in the new lands discovered by Columbus. 

308. The Circumnavigation of the Globe by Magellan (15 19- 
1522). — Such was the situation of things when Magellan laid 
before the young Emperof Charles V, grandson of the Isabella 
who had given Columbus his commission, his plan of reaching 
the Moluccas, or " Spice Islands," which he contended were in 
Spanish waters,^ by a westward voyage. The young king looked 
with favor upon the navigator's plans, and placed under his com- 
mand a fleet of five small vessels. 

Magellan directed his ships in a southwesterly course across 
the Atlantic, hoping to find tov/ards the south a break in the new- 
found lands. Near the most southern point of South America he 

6 The claim of the popes to the right thus to dispose of pagan lands was believed 
to be supported by such Scripture texts as this : " Ask of me, and I shall give thee 
the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy pos- 
session" (Psalms ii. 8). Spain and Portugal recognized this claim, but the Catholic 
sovereigns in general only in so far as it coincided with their interests to do so. 
After the Lutheran revolt the rulers of the Protestant states gave no heed to it. 

' Hugo Grotius (i 583-1645), the eminent Dutch jurist, in a treatise entitled Mare 
Liberum, refuted this theory, and in opposition to it maintained that the ocean should 
be free to all, — a far-reaching doctrine which finally became a part of the common 
law of nations. 

8 There was difficulty in determining just where among the islands Ijdng south- 
east of Asia the papal line of demarcation, when carried around the globe, should run. 



CIRCUMNAVIGATION OF THE GLOBE 283 

found the narrow strait that now bears his name. Through this 
channel the bold sailor pushed his vessels and found himself upon 
a great sea with a blank horizon to the west. From the calm, 
unruffled face of the new ocean, so different from the stormy 
Atlantic, he gave to it the name Pacific. 

The voyage of these first intruders ® from the Old World upon 
the unknown sea, beneath the strange constellations of the 
southern skies, was one of almost incredible sufferings, endured 
with the bravest fortitude. Finally, on March 16, 1 5 2 1 , Magellan 
reached the group of islands now known as the Philippines, hav- 
ing been so named in honor of Philip II, Charles' son and his 
successor on the Spanish throne. On one of these islands Magellan 
was killed- in a fight with the natives. 

The year following the discovery of the -Philippines a single 
battered ship of the fleet, the Victoria, with eighteen men out ot 
the original crews of over two hundred sailors, entered the Spanish 
port of Seville. The globe had for the first time been circum- 
navigated. The most adventurous enterprise of which record has 
been preserved had been successfully accomplished. " In the whole 
history of human undertakings," says Draper, "there is nothing 
that exceeds, if, indeed, there is anything that equals, this voyage 
of Magellan's. That of Columbus dwindles away in comparison." 

Equally does the exploit seem to have impressed the imagi- 
nation of Magellan's own age. The old writer Richard Eden 
(b. about 152 1) refers to it as "a thing doubtless so strange and 
marvelous that, as the like was never done before, so is it perhaps 
never like to be done again; so far have the navigations of the 
Spaniards excelled the voyage of Jason and the Argonauts to the 
region of Colchis, or all that ever were before " ; and a Spanish 
contemporary declares, " Nothing more notable in navigation has 
ever been heard of since the voyage of the patriarch Noah." 

The results of the achievement were greater in the intellectual 
realm than in the commercial or the political domain. It revo- 
lutionized whole systems of mediaeval theory and belief ; it pushed 
aside old narrow geographical ideas ; it settled forever and for all 

8 The Pacific had several years before this been seen at the Isthmus of Darien. 



284 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 




men the question as to the shape and size of the earth. It brought 
to an end the scholastic controversy concerning the antipodes, 
-^that is, whether there were men living on the "under" side 

of the earth. The state of 
most men's minds in regard 
to this matter had till then 
been just about the same 
as is ours to-day on the 
question whether or not 
the planets are inhabited. 

309. These Voyages and 
Geographical Discoveries 
ushered in a New Epoch. — 
By some geographers civili- 
zation is conceived as hav- 
ing passed through three 
stages, — the potamic or 
river stage, the thalassic or 
inland sea stage, and the 
oceanic stage. In the case 
of our own civilization, 
whose beginnings we seek 
in Egypt and Babylonia, 
these steps or stages seem 
fairly well defined and mark off historical times into three great 
periods, which may be named the River Epoch, the Sea Epoch, 
and the Ocean Epoch. 

The River Epoch was that during which civilization was' 
confined to river valleys, like those of the Nile, the Tigris, and 
the Euphrates. The chief cities of this period, as, for instance, 
Memphis and Thebes ift Egypt, Nineveh and Babylon in Meso- 
potamia, arose on the banks of great streams. Rivers were the 
pathways of commerce. Boats were small and the art of sea 
navigation was practically unknown. 

The Sea Epoch was that during which the Mediterranean was 
the theater of civilization. It was ushered in by the Phoenicians, 



Fig. 55. — "The Antipodes in Deri- 
sion." (From Cosmas, Christian 
Topography ; after Beazley, The Dawn 
of Modern Geography) 

Cosmas lived in the sixth Christian century. In 
the cut here reproduced from his Topography, 
he ridicules the idea of a round earth with 
people on the under side whose heads hang 
downwards. The views of Cosmas as to the 
existence of an antipodal people had de- 
fenders throughout the mediaeval centuries 



THE FIVE EARLY COLONIAL EMPIRES 285 

the first skillful sea navigators, in the second millennium before 
our era. From the river banks the seats of -trade and population 
were transferred to the shores of the Mediterranean, and Tyre 
and Sidon and Carthage and Ephesus and Miletus and Byzan- 
tium and Corinth and Athens and Rome arose and played their 
parts in the transactions of the thalassic age. So entirely did the 
events of this age center in and about the Mediterranean that this 
sea has been aptly called the Forum of the ancient world. 

The Ocean Epoch was opened up by the voyages and geo- 
graphical discoveries of which we have just been speaking. In 
this period the great oceans have ceased to be barriers between 
the nations, and have become instead the natural highways of 
the world's intercourse and commerce.^*' 

310. The Five Early Colonial Empires. — One of the most 
important phases of the earlier history of this Ocean Epoch was 
the expansion of the five states on the Atlantic seaboard of Europe 
— namely, Portugal, Spain, France, the Netherlands, and Eng- 
land — each into a great empire, embracing colonies and depend- 
encies in two hemispheres. This expansion of Europe into Greater 
Europe holds somewhat such a place in modern history as the 
expansion of Hellas into Greater Hellas and of Rome into Greater 
Rome holds in ancient history. 

In the mutual jealousies and the conflicting interests of these 
growing colonial empires is to be found the ground and cause 
of many of the great wars of modern times since the close of 
the reUgious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 
For this reason, although it is our special task to trace the lines 
of the historic development in Europe, we shall from time to 
time call the reader's attention to these European interests out- 
side of the European continent. In the present connection a 
few words in regard to Spanish conquests and the beginnings 
of Spanish colonization in the New World will suffice. 

311. The Conquest of Mexico (15 19-15 21). — The accounts 
of Spanish explorations and conquests in the lands opened up 

W The Ocean Epoch may be conceived as embracing two periods, — the Atlantic 
and the Pacific period. The latter is just opening. See Chapter XLIII on the expan- 
sion of Europe. 



286 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

by the fortunate voyage of Columbus read more like a romance 
than any other chapter in history. They tell of men growing 
old while hunting through strange lands for the Fountain of 
Youth ; of expeditions lost for years to the knowledge of men, 
while searching beneath gloomy forests for El Dorado ; of explo- 
rations upon seas and amidst mountains never before looked upon 
by men of the Old World ; of voyages on ocean-like rivers which 
led no one knew where; and of ancient states conquered and 
their enormous accumulations of gold and silver seized by a few 
score of adventurous knights.^^ 

Perhaps the most brilliant exploit in which the Spanish cava- 
liers engaged during this period of daring and romantic adventure 
was the conquest of Mexico. Reports of a rich and powerful 
" Empire " upon the mainland to the west were constantly spread 
among the Spanish colonists who very soon after the discovery of 
the New World settled the islands in the Gulf of Mexico. These 
stories inflamed the imagination of adventurous spirits among the 
settlers, and an expedition, consisting of five or six hundred foot 
soldiers and sixteen horsemen, was organized and placed under 
the command of Hernando Cortes for the conquest and ''con- 
version" of the heathen nation. The expedition was successful, 
and soon the Spaniards were masters of the greater part of what 
now constitutes the republic of Mexico. 

The state that the conquerors destroyed was not an empire, 
as termed by the contemporary Spanish chroniclers, but rather 
a sort of league or confederacy — something like the Iroquois 
confederacy in the North — formed of three Indian tribes.^^ Of 
these the Aztecs were the leading tribe and gave name to the 
confederacy. At the head of the league stood a sachem, or 
war-chief, who bore the name of Montezuma. 



11 Juan Ponce de Leon started on his romantic expedition in search of the fabled 
spring in 15 12; Vasco de Balboa discovered the Pacific in 15 13; Hernando de Soto, 
while searching for a rich Indian kingdom, found the Mississippi in 1541 ; and in the 
same year Francisco de Orellana descended the eastern slope of the Andes to the 
Napo, floated down that stream to the Amazon, and then drifted on down to the sea- 

12 Prescott's description of the Mexican state, especially as to its political organi 
zation, is mjgleading. For later authorities see bibliography at end of the chapter. 




s along the Equator 



EXPLORATIONS AND COLONIES 
OF THE 15TH, 16TH,AND 17TH CENTURIES 

BRITISH I J FRENCH C 

SPAJNISH [ 



BANISH L 



] PORTUGUESE I 
British and Frencli Rival Claims 



J DUTCH I 

ZZjCZZD 



WOBKS, BuCFALO 



20 Longitude 40 East from 60 Greenwich 80 



THE CONQUEST OF PERU 287 

The Aztecs, at the time of the discovery of America, had 
reached what is called the "middle stage of barbarism," — a 
stage of culture which the Mediterranean races had reached 
and passed probably two thousand years before Christ. They 
employed a system of picture-writing. Their religion was a sort 
of sun worship. They were cannibals and offered human victims 
in their sacrifices. They had no knowledge of the horse or the 
ox, or of any other useful domesticated animal except the dog.^* 
They cultivated maize, but were without wheat, oats, or barley. 
They held their lands in common, and lived in communal or 
joint-tenement houses, which were large enough to accommo- 
date from ten to one hundred famiUes. It was these immense 
structures which the Spanish writers described as "palaces" and 
" public edifices." These buildings were, doubtless, the same in 
plan as those to be seen at the present day among the Pueblo 
Indians of the southwestern part of the United States. 

312. The Conquest of Peru (1532-15 36). — Shortly after the 
conquest of the Indians of Mexico the subjugation of the Indians 
of Peru was effected. The civilization of the Peruvians was supe- 
rior to that of the Mexicans. It has been compared, as to several 
of its elements, to that of ancient Assyria. Not only were the 
great cities of the empire filled with splendid temples and pal- 
aces, but throughout the country were to be seen magnificent 
works of public utility, such as roads, bridges, and aqueducts. 
The government of the Incas, the royal or ruling race, was a 
mild, paternal autocracy. 

Glowing reports of the enormous wealth of the Incas, the 
commonest articles in whose palaces, it was asserted, were of 
soHd gold, reached the Spaniards by way of the Isthmus of 
Darien, and it was not long before an expedition, consisting 

13 It has been conjectured that the backwardness in civilization of the native races 
of the Americas is to be attributed in part to their lack of useful tame animals. See 
Fiske, The Discovery of America, vol. i, p. 27. The native fauna of the New 
World as compared with that of the Old is singularly poor in tamable species. Aside 
from the llama, the alpaca, and the turkey, the New World has contributed nothing 
of essential value to the great store of domesticated stocks which constitute the basis 
of so large a part of modern industry. 



2S8 BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 

of less than two hundred men, was organized for the conquest 
of the country. The leader of the band was Francisco Pizarro, 
an iron-hearted, cruel, and illiterate adventurer. 

Through treachery Pizarro made a prisoner of the Inca, Ata- 
hualpa. The captive offered, as a ransom for his release, to fill 
the room in which he was confined " as high as he could reach " 
with vessels of gold. Pizarro accepted the offer, and the palaces 
and temples throughout the empire were stripped of their golden 
vessels, and the apartment was filled with the precious relics. The 
value of the treasure is estimated at over ;^ 15,000,000. When 
this vast wealth was once under the control of the Spaniards, 
they seized it all, and then treacherously put the Inca to death 
(1533)' With the death of Atahualpa the power of the Inca 
dynasty passed away forever. 

313. Beginnings of Spanish Colonization in the New World. — 
Not until more than one hundred years after the discovery of 
the Western Hemisphere by Columbus was there established a 
single permanent English settlement within the limits of what is 
now the United States ; but into those parts of the new lands 
opened up by Spanish exploration and conquest there began to 
pour at once a tremendous stream of Spanish adventurers and 
colonists in search of fortune and fame. Upon the West India 
Islands, in Mexico, in Central America, all along the Pacific slope 
of the Andes, and everywhere upon the lofty and pleasant table- 
lands that had formed the heart of the empire of ^he Incas, there 
sprang up rapidly cities as centers of mining and agricultural 
industries, of commerce and of trade. Often, as in the case of 
Mexico, Quito, and Cuzco, these new cities were simply the 
renovated and rebuilt towns of the conquered natives. 

Thus did a Greater Spain grow up in the New World. Before 
the close of the sixteenth century the dominions of the Spanish 
monarch in the new lands formed of themselves a magnificent 
empire, and were the source, chiefly through the wealth of their 
gold and silver mines, of a large revenue to the royal exchequer. 
It was, in part, the treasures derived from these new possessions 
that enabled the sovereigns of Spain to play the important part 



SUGGESTION TO TEACHERS 289 

they did in the affairs of Europe during the century following the 
discovery of America.-^* 

Having thus indicated one source of Spanish greatness and 
reputation, it will be one of our aims in a following chapter to 
give some idea of the way in which this power and prestige were 
used by the Spanish sovereigns in maintaining the supremacy of 
the Catholic Church in the interests of Spain. 



Suggestion to Teachers — Comparative Study 

In no way, we think, will the teacher be able to give his pupils so 
clear an idea of the character of the sixteenth century as by having 
them make a comparative study of that century and the nineteenth. 
The striking parallels which they will discover between the two 
periods will be sure to suggest to them that "the wonderful nine- 
teenth century," as it is called by Alfred Russel Wallace, like the 
sixteenth, may be a transition period, a period which will be regarded 
by the future historian as we regard the sixteenth, — as the beginning 
of a new age in history. Having gained this viewpoint, they will see 
all the events, movements, and enterprises of the earlier period under 

14 After having robbed the Indians of their wealth in gold and silver, the slow 
accumulations of centuries, the Spaniards further enriched themselves by the enforced 
labor of the unfortunate natives. Unused to such toil as was exacted of them under 
the lash of worse than Egyptian taskmasters, the Indians wasted away by millions 
in the mines of Mexico and Peru, and upon the sugar plantations of the West Indies. 
More than half of the native population of Peru is thought to have been consumed 
in the Peruvian mines. " During fifty years," says a recent writer, " the Spaniards 
uniformly conquered and enslaved [the natives] ; put them to forced labour, to which 
they were physically unequal; and on the least resistance or other provocation, 
massacred them in great numbers. One estimate says that in these years 40,000,000 
of the native Americans perished by violence : the lowest makes the number 10,000,- 
000 ; and it is to be feared the former is nearer the truth. It is certain that the islands 
of the West Indies once contained nearly 6,000,000 of a race now quite extinct; 
and that in Hayti alone they sank, in fifteen years, from 1,000,000 to 60,000, and, in 
fifty years, to 200" (Payne, Etirofean Colonies, pp. 89, 90). As a substitute for 
native labor, negroes were introduced. This was the beginning of the African slave 
trade in the New World. At the outset the traffic was approved by a benevolent 
bishop named Las Casas (1474-1566), known as the " Apostle of the Indians." Before 
his death, however, Las Casas came to recognize the wickedness of negro as well as 
of Indian slavery, and to regret that he had ever expressed approval of the plan of 
substituting one for the other. See Fiske, The Discovery of America, vol. ii, pp. 
454-458. 



290 



BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COLONIZATION 



a familiar light. The following will suggest in what realms parallels 
may be sought : 



The Sixteenth Century 

a. The New Learning. Great intellec- 
tual activity. 

h. The Reformation. Revision of creeds. 
Relation of the religious move- 
ment to the Renaissance. 

c. The imification of great nations, — 

England, France, Spain. 

d. The expansion of Europe; the par- 

tition of the New World and of 
Southern Asia. The formation of 
colonial empires, — Portuguese, 
Spanish, Dutch, French, and Eng- 
Ush. 

e. Great geographical and astronom- 

ical discoveries (Columbus, Coper- 
nicus), which reveal the universe 
as infinite in space. Man's concep- 
tions concerning the earth and its 
place in the universe revolution- 
ized. 

f. Great inventions, now first hit upon or 

tffought into general use, — print- 
ing, gunpowder, and the mariner's 
compass. Political, social, and 
economic revolutions caused or 
promoted by them. 



The Nineteenth Century 

The New Sciences. Great intellectual 
activity. 

The New Theology. Revision of 
creeds. Relation of this movement 
to the birth of the new scientific 
spirit. 

The unification of great nations,— 
Germany, Italy. 

The expansion of Europe; the par- 
tition of Africa and of Oceania. 
The formation of new colonial 
empires, — English, French, Ger- 
man, Belgian, and American. 

Great geological and biological dis- 
coveries {Evolution — Lyell, Dar- 
win), which reveal the universe as 
infinite in time. Man's conceptions 
as to his origin and his place in 
the plan of creation revolutionized. 

Great inventions, — the steam rail- 
way, the ocean steamship, the elec- 
tric telegraph, electric motor, etc. 
Political, social, and economic revo- 
lutions caused or furthered by their 
introduction. 



Selections from the Sources. — Cathay and the Way Thither (ed. by 
Colonel Yule). The student here learns with what knowledge of Eastern 
Asia Columbus and the others set out, and what they expected to find. 
The Journal of Christopher Columbus (Hakluyt Society publications). Old 
South Leaflets, Nos. 29, 31-36, 39, 71, 89, 90, 102. The First Three Eng- 
lish Books on America (ed. by Edward Arber). This work possesses a special 
fascination. " One is able therein," as says the editor, " to look out on the 
New World as its discoverers and first explorers looked upon it." 

Secondary Works. — Keane, The Evolution of Geography, chaps, v-viii. 
Beazley, Prince Henry the Navigator. There are numerous hves of Colum- 
bus: Winsor's, Irving's, C. K. Adams', and Markham's can be recom- 
mended. GuiLLEMARD, The Life of Ferdinand Magellan. FiSKE, The 
Discovery of America. There is not a chapter here that will fail to interest 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 29I 

and charm young readers. The Cambridge Modern History, vol. i, chap, i, 
" The Age of Discovery " ; and chap, ii, " The New World." Bourne, 
Essays in Historical Criticism, Essay No. 6, " Prince Henry the Naviga- 
tor," and Essay No. 7, " The Demarcation Line of Pope Alexander VI." 
Prescott, Conquest of Mexico and Conquest of Peru ; should be read in 
connection with later works. Stephens, Albuquerque. Payne, History 
of the New World called America, vol. i, pp. 303-364; for the relation of the 
aboriginal civilizations of the Americas to their animal and plant life. 

Topics for Class Reports. — I. Copernicus and the slow acceptance 
of his theory. See A.. D. White, A History of the Warfare of Science 
and Theology, vol. i, chap. iii. 2. Prince Henry the Navigator. 3. The 
legend of Prester John. 4. The Naming of America. See article by Pro- 
fessor E. G. Bourne, in The American Historical Review for October, 1904. 
5. Civilization of the Aztecs. 6. Civilization of the Peruvians. 



CHAPTER XX 
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

314. Introductory Statement. — When the Modem Age opened 
the European peoples were on the eve of a great religious revolu- 
tion. This was a dual movement. It was an insurrection against 
the Papacy, resulting in the severance by half the nations of 
Europe of the bonds which throughout the mediaeval time had 
united them to the ecclesiastical empire of the Roman pontiffs. 
Since the secession movement was successful, it is rightly called 
a revolution, — the Protestant- Revolution. 

But the movement was something more than a successful 
rebellion against ecclesiastical authority. It was, as we shall 
learn, caused in large part by the existence of certain evils and 
abuses in the Church, and resulted in a great renovation of the 
religious and moral life of Western Christendom. Hence it is 
properly spoken of as a reform, — as the Reformation. 

That the movement was a dual one should be carefully noted, 
for it is only when regarded from both the indicated points of 
view that its complex phenomena can be intelligently observed 
and rightly interpreted. In the present chapter we shall speak of 
the causes and the beginnings of the revolution ; in succeeding 
chapters we shall follow the vicissitudes of its fortunes in the 
principal countries of Northern Europe. 

315. Causes of the Reformation. — Our first endeavor must be 
to get some sort of comprehension of what caused the northern 
nations of Europe first to become dissatisfied with the state of 
things ecclesiastical and religious, and then to secede from the 
ancient Church. There were various causes. 

One cause was the Renaissance, that great intellectual awaken- 
ing which marked the close of the mediaeval and the opening of 

292 



CAUSES OF THE REFORMATION 293 

the modem epoch. As we have already learned, the revival of 
the liberal culture of classical antiquity evoked a critical, self- 
reliant spirit which was profoundly antagonistic to the whole 
mediaeval system of ideas and practices. We shall see in a moment 
how it was the antagonism which developed between the pro- 
moters of the New Learning and the upholders of the scholastic 
theology that helped to prepare the way for the great schism. 

A second cause of the revolution was the existence in the 
Church of most serious scandals and abuses. In many cases 
religion instead of being a thing of the heart had become, in a 
lamentable degree, merely a matter of ceremonies and outer ob- 
servances. In practice, if not in theory, with many religion was 
regarded as one thing and morality as quite another. The neces- 
sity of the amendment of this state of things, of the thorough 
reform of the Church in both " head and members," was recog- 
nized by all earnest and spiritually minded men. The only differ- 
ence of opinion among such was as to the manner in which the 
work of renovation should be effected, whether from within or 
from without, by reform or by revolution. 

A third cause was jealousy of the Papacy on the part of the 
temporal princes, and the clash of papal claims with the rising 
sentiment of national patriotism. It is true that the claims to 
temporal supremacy put forward by some of the mediaeval popes 
were no longer maintained ; still there remained a very large field 
embracing matters such as appointment or nomination to Church 
offices, the taxation of the clergy and of Church property, ques- 
tions concerning marriages, wills, and so on, which the popes as 
the guardians of religion claimed the right to regulate or to review. 
Thus the nations were really very far from being independent. 
As respects many matters which we now regard as attaching to 
national sovereignty, they were virtually provinces of an ecclesi- 
astical world-empire centered at Rome. 

The situation might be illustrated by a comparison with that 
in a federal commonwealth like our own. Just as in our Union 
every person owes allegiance to two authorities, that of his State 
and that of the Federal Government, so in mediaeval times every 



294 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

person owed allegiance to two authorities, — to his own king and 
to the Roman pontiff. And as before our Civil War it was often 
difficult for one to determine whether his first duty was to his 
own State or to the Federal Government, so before the Protestant 
Revolution it was often difficult for one to decide to which he 
owed superior allegiance, — to his own prince or to the Pope. As 
regards the monks and the other clergy, the question was apt 
to be decided in favor of the papal see, for they were prone to 
regard themselves as subjects of the Pope rather than as subjects 
of the king under whose rule they lived. 

But it was at the 'point where the papal supremacy interfered 
with the financial interests of the lay governments that the most 
friction and trouble developed. As head of the Church the popes 
were drawing an immense revenue from every state embraced 
within the ecclesiastical empire. A large part of the landed prop- 
erty of Europe was in the hands of the Church, and a consider- 
able portion of the vast revenues derived from it was, in the form 
of annates and contributions of the clergy, drawn into the Roman 
treasury. Furthermore, through the system of papal indulgences 
(sec. 320) vast additional sums were collected for papal use in all 
the different countries. In some countries the direct and indirect 
contributions of the people to the papal see probably exceeded 
the taxes which they paid to their own government. Moreover, 
it was a matter of notoriety that the immense sums drawn to Rome 
were not always used in the promotion of religious objects, but, 
in the hands of unworthy pontiffs, like Alexander VI, were used 
to further personal ambitions or to promote the political fortunes 
of the Papacy. 

This state of things culminating just at the time when the 
sentiment of nationahty was awakening in several of the different 
countries, and just when the secular governments, growing stronger, 
were assuming new functions and were requiring larger revenues 
for the maintenance of their standing armies and for other public 
purposes, it was inevitable that among the civil rulers the situation 
should come to be regarded with feelings of ill-will and impatience. 
It is doubtless true that in several of the northern countries it 



THE OXFORD HUMANIST REFORMERS 295 

was this condition of things which had more to do in bringing 
about the secession from Rome than had the desire of rehgious 
freedom or of moral reform. 

The circumstances marking the outbreak of the revolution, 
which we shall now proceed to consider, will afford a commentary 
on this brief statement of the causes which produced it. 

316. The Northern Humanists as Precursors of the Reformation. 
— In our study of the Italian Renaissance we noted how the 
revival, which in Italy had been in its essence a restoration of 
classical literature and culture, on crossing the Alps became 
equally a restoration of Hebrew-Christian antiquity, and thus also 
became one of the deepest lying causes of the Protestant Revolu- 
tion (sec. 301). This relation of humanism to the Reformation 
will best be revealed by the presentation of a few facts illustrative 
of the spirit and aims of the humanists of the North. 

317. The Oxford Humanist Reformers. — One of the earliest 
centers of humanism in the North was Oxford in England. Here 
we find, just as the old age was merging into the new, a celebrated 
group of humanists. Among them three men, Colet, Erasmus, 
and More, stand preeminent as promoters of the New Learning. 

John Colet (1466-15 19) was leader and master of the little 
band. His generous enthusiasm was kindled in Italy. It was an 
important event in the history of the Reformation when Colet 
crossed the Alps to learn Greek at the feet of the Greek exiles ; 
for on his return to England he brought back with him not 
only an increased love for the classical learning but a fervent zeal 
for religious reform, inspired, perhaps, by the stirring eloquence 
of Savonarola. His lectures at Oxford on St. Paul's Epistles are 
said to have seemed to his listeners almost Hke a new revela- 
tion. The great influence of Colet upon the world was exerted 
for the most part indirectly, — through Erasmus and More^ his 
disciples and fellow-workers. 

Desiderius Erasmus (i467?-i536) of Rotterdam went to Eng- 
land to learn Greek. There he came into close friendship with 
Colet, More, and other lovers of learning, with whom he declared 
he could have been happy in Scythia. He was the leader of the 



296 



BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 



humanistic movement in the North, as Petrarch was the father 
of the movement in the South. His celebrated satire entitled 
Morice Encomium, or "Praise of Folly" (1509), was directed 
against the foibles of all classes of society, but particularly against 
the sins of " unholy men in holy orders." A little later (in 15 16) 
Erasmus published his Novum Instrumentum, the Greek text of 

the New Testament 
with a Latin version. 
These publications 
must be given a 
prominent place 
among the agencies 
which prepared the 
minds and hearts of 
the northern peo- 
ples for the Refor- 
mation. 

Thomas More 
(14 7 8-1 5 3 5) was 
declared by Colet 
to be the sole gen- 
ius in all England. 
He was a man with 
whom men were 
said to "fall in 
love." As the 
author of Utopia he is, perhaps, after Erasmus, the best known 
of all the humanists of the North. His work, while closely associ- 
ated with the religious and social history of the Reformatiori period 
in England, had less significance than that of either Colet or 
Erasmus for the reform movement at large, and it is in connec- 
tion with English history that we shall have occasion to refer to 
it again (sec. 377). 

Than this early Oxford movement, nothing better illustrates 
the relation of the humanistic revival in the North to the religious 
reform. Here the humanist was the reformer. But the Oxford 




Fig. 56. 



Erasmus. (After a painting by 
Holbein) 



GERMAN HUMANISM 297 

reformers, it should be carefully noted, were not Protestant reform- 
ers. They believed in the divine character of the papal supremacy. 
They wished indeed to reform the Papacy, but not to destroy it. 
They did not wish to see the mediaeval unity of Christendom 
broken. They had no quarrel with the creed of the Catholic 
Church. Erasmus denounced the doctrines of Luther, and More 
died a martyr's death rather than deny the papal supremacy. 

318. The German Humanists; John Reuchlin. — Even before 
the influence of the Italian humanistic revival had begun to make 
itself felt in Germany, there had already sprung up in that coun- 
try a movement, primarily intellectual, which owed little or noth- 
ing to that which at the same time was running its course in the 
southern land. This movement in its earlier stages was repre- 
sented by an association known as the " Brethren of the Common 
Life." The members of this union founded schools and labored 
to render the education of youth practical and conducive to true 
piety. In these schools were nurtured some of the best scholars 
and best men of the time.^ 

Before the end of the fifteenth century this native movement, 
coming in contact with Italian humanism, received a great 
impulse therefrom, and developed rapidly and spread widely. 
The printing press poured out a flood of books. New universities 
were founded and became propagating centers of the liberal cul- 
ture of the •Renaissance. As was inevitable a conflict straightway 
sprang up between the monastic theologians, who were the cham- 
pions of the old Scholasticism, and the promoters of the New 
Learning. It was the first phase in modern times of the age-long 
warfare between Theology and Science. 

The first blows exchanged by the two parties were given in a 
controversy in which the real principle involved was the freedom 
of scholars in their investigations and the limits of theological 
authority in matters of scholarship. The war raged around the 

1 Three of the most eminent representatives of this early German revival were 
Thomas k Kempis (d. 1471), the reputed author of The Imitation of Christ ; Jacob 
Wimpheling (1450-1528); and Sebastian Brant (1458-1521), who in his ^o^vaNarren- 
schiff^ or " Ship of Fools," satirized with keenest wit evils in both State and Church. 



298 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

person of the eminent humanist John Reuchlin (1455-15 22), the 
same whom we have seen in the closing years of the fifteenth 
century trudging over the Alps in order to study Greek at the 
feet of the Italian masters (sec. 291). 

Hostilities had arisen in this way. It had been proposed by 
haters of the Jews that their books should be taken from them 
and burned, on the ground that these works were unfriendly to 
Christianity. Reuchlin, who was the best Hebrew scholar of his 
time, was asked, by the authorities before whom the matter had 
been brought, for his' opinion on the proposal. He advised 
against it, and embraced the opportunity to say that much of the 
Jewish literature might be read by Christians with great advan- 
tage to themselves. This caused Reuchlin to be bitterly attacked 
by the clerical party. The theological faculties of many of the 
German universities and that of the University of Paris con- 
demned his views, while the humanists, among others Erasmus, 
sent him letters of approval and encouragement. Some of these 
Reuchlin published under the title of Epistolce Clarorum 
Virorum, or " Letters from Illustrious Men." 

The appearance of this collection suggested to some of 
Reuchlin' s friends — the celebrated humanist and picturesque 
knight poet, Ulrich von Hutten (148 8- 152 3), was among them 
— the putting out of a work bearing the title Epistolce Obscuro- 
rum Virortim, or "Letters of Obscure Men" (15 15-15 17). This 
was a series of fictitious letters, written in " choicest bad Latin " 
and crowded with all sorts of absurdities, in which the party 
opposed to Reuchlin were made the subjects of rollicking satire 
and merciless ridicule. To the humanists it was "capital fun," as 
More wrote to Erasmus. 

319. The Humanistic Movement becomes a Religious Reform. 
— The attacks of the humanists on the theologians had been 
inspired primarily not so much by religious feeling or moral indig- 
nation as by a love of sound scholarship and contempt for the 
ignorance and pedantry of the opposers of the New Learning. 

The controversy now assumed a more serious phase. It took on 
the character of a religious debate, became a matter of conscience, 



INDULGENCES; PURGATORY; JUBILEES 299 

also became mixed with political matters, and then finally devel- 
oped into open war between the two parties. The simple narration 
of events as they unfolded in Germany will best convey an idea 
of how circumstances, and the appearance of a great man with 
deep convictions and violent passions, gave this new trend to the 
historic movement. 

320. Indulgences; Purgatory; Jubilees. — Since the subject- 
matter of the debate in its new form was papal indulgences, a 
word concerning these will here be necessary to render inteUigible 
the opening episodes of the great revolution. 

An indulgence, as understood and defined by German theo- 
logians of Luther's time, was the remission of that temporal pun- 
ishment which often remains due on account of sin after its guilt 
has been forgiven.^ It was granted on the performance of some 
work of piety, charity, or mercy, which often included an alms to 
the poor or a gift of money to promote some good work, and 
took effect only upon certain conditions, among which was that 
of confession of sin and sincere repentance. 

Since much of the opposition to indulgences arose from their 
application to souls in purgatory and to abuses arising in this 
connection, a word of explanation is here also necessary. 

According to Catholic teaching, the other world embraces three 
regions, — hell, purgatory, and heaven. This belief is embodied 
in the greal poem of the mediaeval ages, Dante's Divine Comedy. 
Purgatory is a place or state intermediate between heaven and 
hell, where souls destined for eternal bliss are cleansed through 
suffering. This beHef in an intermediate place of punishment 
came to be of historical significance because, according to Catholic 

2 The following is the definition given by Johann von Paltz, a contemporary of 
Luther, in his authoritative treatise on indulgences {Ccelifodina, ed. of 15 11) : Indul- 
gentia est remissio fxnrn temporalis debitcB peccatis actualibus fcemtenttum non 
remisscB in absolutione sacramentali : facta a pr<zlato ecclesi<B rationabthter etex 
rationabili causa: per recompensationem de poena indebita justorum. " An indul- 
gence is a remission of that temporal penalty deserved by the actual sms of peni- 
tents which has not been remitted in sacramental absolution, — a remission granted 
by a prelate of the Church, in rational manner and for rational cause, on the ground 
of the penalty already paid by the undeserved punishment of the just." By "tem- 
poral" punishment is meant penances imposed by the Church and the temporary 
pains of purgatory, as opposed to the eternal punishment of hell. 



300 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

doctrine, souls in this place of purification can be helped and 
their probation shortened by the prayers and good works of their 
surviving friends in their behalf. Thus Dante on the terraces of 
the Mount of Purification met spirits who told him that their 
allotted time of suffering had been shortened by the mediatorial 
prayers of their friends. The vast endowments of the mediaeval 
monasteries were in large part given that Masses might be said for 
the repose of the souls of the donors. And not only were interces- 
sory prayers counted capable of releasing souls from purgatory, 
but the indulgence was deemed valid also for the dead as well as 
for the living. 

Before the time of the Reformation, indulgences had been fre- 
quently granted by various pontiffs, with different objects in view. 
Thus in the time of the Crusades plenary ^ indulgences were offered 
to all who assumed the cross. Indulgences were also often resorted 
to as a means of raising money for the construction and mainte- 
nance of churches, convents, and bridges, and for the promotion 
of other local undertakings. A great part of the money for the 
building of St. Peter's at Rome was obtained in this manner. 

During the later mediaeval period the system received a vast 
extension through the use of the indulgence to draw pilgrims to 
Rome. In the year 1300 Pope Boniface VIII proclaimed a 
jubilee, which was to be celebrated thereafter every hundredth 
year, and offered plenary indulgence to all who, during the year, 
should, in the proper spirit, visit the churches of St. Peter and 
St. Paul in Rome. The crowds drawn to the capital by this 
inducement exceed belief. It seemed as though all Christendom 
were thronging into the Holy City. In following times the 
interval between one jubilee and the next was successively 
shortened until the term was reduced to twenty-five years. These 
recurring jubilees form one of the most striking features of the 
religious life of the later Middle Ages. By multiplying the offer- 
mgs of the faithful they brought vast sums into the papal treasury, 
and thus greatly enhanced the power and influence of the holy see. 

8 A plenary or full indulgence remits to a penitent the whole of the temporal pun- 
ishment to which he is liable at the time of receiving the remission. 



TETZEL AND PREACHING OF INDULGENCES 301 

321. Tetzel and the Preaching of Indulgences. — Leo X, upon 
his election to the papal dignity in 15 13, found the coffers of the 
Church almost empty, and being in pressing need of money to 
carry on his various undertakings, among which was work upon 
St. Peter's, he had recourse to the now common expedient of a 
grant of indulgences. He delegated the power of dispensing 
these in a great part of Germany to Archbishop Albert of Mainz. 
As his deputy, Albert employed a Dominican friar by the name 
of John Tetzel. 

The archbishop was unfortunate in the selection of his agent. 
Tetzel carried out his commission in such a way as to give rise to 
a great scandal. The language that he and his subordinates used 
in exhorting the people to comply with the conditions of gaining 
the indulgences — one of which was a donation of money — was 
unseemly and exaggerated. 

The result was that erroneous views as to the effect of indul- 
gences began to spread among the ignorant and credulous, many 
being so far misled as to think that if they only contributed this 
money to the building of St. Peter's in Rome they would be 
exempt from all penalty for sins, paying httle heed to the other 
conditions, such as sorrow for sin and purpose of amendment. 
Hence serious persons were led to declaim against the procedure 
of the zealous friar. These protests were the near mutterings of 
a storm that had long been gathering, and that was soon to shake 
all Europe from the Baltic to the Mediterranean. 

322. Martin Luther; his Pilgrimage to Rome. — Foremost 
among those who opposed and denounced the methods used by 
Tetzel was Martin Luther, an Augustinian monk and teacher of 
theology in the University of Wittenberg. This great reformer 
was bom in Saxony in 1483. He was of humble parentage, his 
father being a poor miner. Just as a career planned by his father 
in the profession of the law was opening before him, he suddenly 
turned his back upon the world and entered a convent. 

Before Tetzel appeared in Germany, Luther had already earned 
a wide reputation for learning and piety. A few years before this 
(in 1 5 it) he had made, in the interest of his order, a memorable 



302 



BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 



journey to Rome. His reverence for Rome and the Pope was 
at that time unimpaired. Rome was in his eyes as sacred as Jeru- 
salem. The Pope he regarded as God's representative on earth. 

He had no doubts about 
purgatory ; he was al- 
most sorry that his 
parents were not dead 
that he might, at the 
holy places in Rome, 
pray their souls out of 
that place of suffering. 
But the simple Ger- 
man monk saw things at 
Rome which gave his 
reverence a rude shock. 
He had expected to see 
every one " awed in per- 
petual reverence by the 
holy atmosphere of the 
place." Instead, he 
found luxury and skep- 
ticism, — often open 
profligacy and irrever- 
ence for holy things. 
All this produced a 
deep impression upon 
the serious-minded monk. The seed had been sown which was 
destined to yield a great harvest. 

323. The Ninety-Five Theses (15 17). — It was six years after 
Luther's visit to Rome when Tetzel began in the neighborhood 
of Wittenberg, where Luther was, the preaching of indulgences 
in the scandalous manner to which we have just alluded. The 
people were running in great crowds after the preacher of indul- 
gences. Luther was greatly distressed. Not being able to get any 
one in authority to intervene to put a stop to the scandal, he 
resolved to take hold of the matter himself. Accordingly he drew 




Fig. 57. — Martin Luther. (After the 
portrait by Lucas Cranach, the elder ; 
Uffizi Gallery, Florence) 



LUTHER'S ADDRESS 303 

up ninety-five theses bearing on indulgences, and nailed them 
upon the door of the castle church at Wittenberg. It was a cus- 
tom of those times for a scholar thus to post propositions which 
he was willing to maintain against any and all comers. An exam- 
ination of the theses shows that Luther at this time still held the 
generally accepted view both as to purgatory and the validity of 
indulgences, and that his protest was aimed only at abuses. 

By means of the press the theses were spread broadcast. They 
were eagerly read and commented upon by all classes, particularly 
in Germany. Tetzel issued counter-propositions. Learned theo- 
logians^ entered the lists against the presumptuous monk. The 
air was thick with controversial leaflets. At first Pope Leo had 
been inclined to make light of the whole matter, declaring that 
it was "a mere squabble of monks," but at length he felt con- 
strained to take decisive measures against Luther. The monk 
was to be silenced by means of a papal bull. 

324. Luther's ''Address to the Christian Nobility of the German 
Nation " (July, 1520). — Luther heard that the bull was soon to 
be launched against him. He anticipated its arrival by the issu- 
ance to the German nobility of a remarkable address, which has 
been called "The Manifesto of the Reformation." This was 
beyond question the most significant historically of all the pro- 
ductions of this age of theses and counter-theses, of bulls and 
bans, of manifestoes and appeals. It was practically a German 
declaration of independence of Rome. 

Luther demanded, among other things, that payment to the 
Pope of annates^ should be forbidden by the princes, nobles, 

4 Prominent among these disputants were Cardinal Cajetan (1469-1534) and John 
Eck (1486-1543). 

5 Annates, or first fruits, were the first year's revenue, or some portion of the first 
year's revenue, of a benefice paid to the Pope by a bishop, abbot, or other ecclesiastic 
for the papal confirmation in his office. This was a most important source of reve- 
nue to the Roman court. The temporal princes naturally regarded these payments 
by their subjects to the Pope with great jealousy, since in this way immense sums 
of money passed out of their dominions and into the Roman treasury. Consequently 
this subject of annates was a source of endless disagreement and controversy between 
the civil governments of Europe and the Papacy. In England the prohibition of the 
payment of first fruits to the Pope was one of the earliest steps taken in the separa- 
tion from Rome. See sec. 370. 



304 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

and cities, or that they should be wholly abolished ; that " no 
episcopal cloak and no confirmation of an appointment should 
be obtained from Rome " ; that the Pope should have no power 
whatever over the Emperor, "save to anoint and crown him at 
the altar"; and that the secular clergy should be free to marry 
or not to marry.^ 

325. Luther burns the Papal Bull (Dec. 10, 1520). — At length 
a copy of the papal bull came into Luther's hands. Forty-one 
propositions 'selected from his writings were therein condemned 
either as "heretical" or as "scandalous," and all persons were 
forbidden to read his books, which were ordered to be burned ; 
and he himself, if he did not retract his errors within sixty days, 
was, together with all his adherents, to be regarded as having 
"incurred the penalty due for heresy." 

Luther now took a startling determination. He resolved to 
burn the papal bull. A fire was kindled outside one of the 
gates of Wittenberg, and in the presence of a great throng of 
doctors, students, and citizens, Luther cast the bull, together with 
the papal decretals and some books of his opponents, into the 
flames. 

The audacious proceeding raised a terrible storm, which raged 
" high as the heavens, wide as the earth." Luther wrote a friend 
that he believed the tempest could never be stilled before the 
day of judgment. 

326. The Diet of Worms (15 21). — Aifairs had now assumed a 
threatening aspect. All Germany was in a state of revolt. The 
papal supremacy was imperiled. The papal ban having failed 
to produce any effect. Pope Leo now invoked the aid of the 
recently elected Emperor Charles V in extirpating the spreading 
heresy. He wished Luther to be sent to Rome for trial there. 
Luther's friends, however, persuaded Charles not to accede to the 
Pope's request, but to permit Luther to be heard in Germany. 

6 Luther was not at this time ready to release monks from their vows. Gradually, 
however, his views changed and he came to regard the celibacy of the monks as 
opposed to Scripture teachings. In the year 1525, acting upon his maturer views, he 
married Catharine Bora, a former nun. This violation by Luther of his monastic 
vows was made the subject of bitter reproach against him by his enemies. 



THE DIET OF WORMS 305 

Accordingly Luther received an imperial summons to appear at 
Worms before an assembly of the princes, nobles, and clergy of 
Germany to be convened for the purpose of deliberating upon 
the affairs of the country, and especially upon matters touching the 
great religious controversy. 

Luther's journey to Worms was a triumphal progress. The 
eyes of all Germany were upon him. The crowds that lined the 
streets of the towns through which he passed showed how pro- 
foundly the German heart had been stirred. At Worms the roofs 
of the houses along the streets traversed by the monk in his 
entrance into the city were loaded with his sympathizers.'^ 

When Luther first appeared before the brilliant and august 
assembly he was visibly embarrassed. But he soon recovered 
his composure. His books were placed befgre him, and he was 
asked whether he would retract what he had written therein. He 
requested a day's time to consider his answer. The next day, 
brought again before the Diet, he replied in substance : "To 
revoke these writings would be to give new force and audacity to 
the Roman tyranny. I cannot, I will not, retract anything, unless 
what I have written shall be shown to be contrary to Holy Scrip- 
ture or to plain reason, for to act against conscience is neither 
safe nor upright." His closing words were impressive : " I can do 
no otherwise ; here I stand, God help me. Amen." 

Although some wished to deliver the reformer to the flames, 
the safe-conduct of the Emperor under which he had come to 
the Diet protected him. So Luther was allowed to depart in 
safety, but was followed by the ban of the Empire. 

327. Luther at the Wartburg (15 21-15 22). — Luther, how- 
ever, had powerful friends, among whom was his own prince, 
Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony. Solicitous for the safety 
of the reformer, the prince caused him to be seized on his way 
from the Diet by a company of masked horsemen, who carried 

■^ As Luther neared Worms it was whispered to him that treason against him was 
being planned within the city. His friends, alarmed at this report, tried to dissuade 
him from exposing his life by going on. It was then he made his famous declara- 
tion, " I would go though there were as many devils there as there are tiles on the 
roofs of the houses." 



3o6 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

him to the castle of the Wartburg, where he was kept about a 
year, his retreat being known only to a few friends. 

During this period of forced retirement from the world Luther 
was busy writing pamphlets and translating the Bible. Appeal 
had been made to the Scriptures, — " Prove it from the Scrip- 
tures," "There it is written," was the constant challenge of the 
reformers to their opponents, — hence it was necessary that the 
Scriptures should be accessible in a language understood by all.^ 
It was hard work, as Luther put it, to make the old prophets 
speak German, but he made them speak it in a way which has 
fixed to this day the attention of the German nation. 

In giving Germany this translation of the Bible, Luther ren- 
dered some such service to the German tongue as Dante ren- 
dered to the Itahan through his Divine Comedy. Fixing its 
literary forms, he virtually created the German language out of 
a chaos of dialects. 

328. The Peasants* War (1524-1525). — Before quite a year 
had passed Luther was drawn from the Wartburg by the troubles 
caused by certain radical reformers whose preaching was occa- 
sioning tumult and violence, and thereby bringing into discredit 
the whole reform movement. Luther's sudden appearance at 
Wittenberg gave a temporary check to the agitation. 

But in the course of two or three years the trouble broke out 
afresh, and in a more complex and aggravated form. The peas- 
ants of Suabia and Franconia, stung to madness by the oppres- 
sions of their feudal lords, stirred by the religious excitement 
that filled the air, and influenced by the incendiary preaching 
of their prophets Carlstadt and Miinzer, rose in revolt against 
the nobles and the priests, — against all in authority.® Castles 
and monasteries were sacked and burned, and horrible outrages 
were committed. The rebeUion was finally crushed, but not 
until a hundred thousand lives had been sacrificed, a large part 
of South Germany devastated, and great reproach cast upon the 

8 There had been before this translations of the Bible into German, but the editions 
had been small and the circulation limited. 

9 The demands of the peasants were embodied in a document known as the 
Twelve Articles. See Translations and Refrints (Univ. of Penn.), vol. ii, No. 6. 



SECULARIZATION OF CHURCH PROPERTY 307 

reformers, whose teachings were held by their enemies to be the 
whole cause of the ferment.^* 

329. The Secularization of Church Property. — But in spite of 
all these discrediting movements the reform made rapid progress. 
Nothing contributed more to win over the lay princes to the views 
of Luther than his recommendation that the monasteries should 
be suppressed and their property confiscated and devoted to the 
maintenance of churches, schools, and charities.^^ 

The lay rulers were quick to act upon this suggestion, and to 
go far beyond it. Within a very few years after the appearance 
of Luther's address to the German nobility and another treatise 
of his on monastic vows (1522), wherein he pronounced such 
vows to be contrary to true Christian principles, there were con- 
fiscations of ecclesiastical property in all the German states that 
had become Protestant. 

In Sweden, in which country the doctrines of Luther gained 
an early foothold, almost all the property of the old Church 
was, by an act of the National Diet, given into the hands of the 
king, Gustavus Vasa (1524). This wealth contributed greatly to 
enhance the power and prestige of the Swedish monarchy. 

In England, King Henry VIII, under circumstances which we 
shall consider in another chapter, suppressed the monasteries 
and diverted to secular uses the greater part of their wealth. 

But the classical instance of the secularizing of Church prop- 
erty during this period is afforded by the case of the Teutonic 
Knights (sec. 154). At- the beginning of the Protestant revolt 
these monk knights ruled over from two to three million subjects. 
When the reform movement began to spread over Germany the 
Grand Master of the order, Albert of Brandenburg, turned Protes- 
tant, and converted the domains of the fraternity into an hereditary 

10 About a decade after the suppression of the Peasants' Revolt the religious 
excitement of the time brought into existence the so-called New Zion, or Anabaptist 
kingdom of Miinster, a sort of theocracy, of which the head was John of Leyden 
(i5io?-i536). There was in this movement a most startling exhibition of religious 
fanaticism. Like the rebellion of the peasants, it tended greatly to discredit the 
genuine reform party. 

11 All such taking over of Church property by the state was called " seculariza- 
tion." 



3o8 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

principality under the name of the Duchy of Prussia (1525). The 
knights married and became nobles. Thus was created out of 
ecclesiastical lands a most important secular state. 

330. The Reformers are called Protestants ; the Augsburg 
Confession. — The rapid progress of the revolution alarmed the 
upholders of the ancient Church. In the year 1529 there gath- 
ered an assembly known as the Second Diet of Spires to consider 
the matter. The action of the Catholic majority of this body 
took away from the Protestant princes and cities the right they 
had hitherto enjoyed of determining what form of religion should 
be followed in their domains, and forbade the teaching of certain 
of the new doctrines until a Church council should have pro- 
nounced authoritatively upon them. 

Six of the German princes and a large number of the cities of 
the Empire issued a formal protest against the action of the Diet, 
denying the power or right of a majority to bind the minority in 
matters of religion and conscience. Because of this protest, the 
reformers from this time began to be known as Protestants, 

The year following that in which this protest was made the 
adherents of Luther, at the request of the Emperor Charles, laid 
before another Diet assembled at Augsburg (1530) their formula 
of belief, known as the Augsburg Confession. It was drawn up by 
the eminent scholar Melanchthon, and came to form the basis 
of the Lutheran Church. 

331. The Catholic Reaction; its Causes and Agents. — Even 
before the death of Luther, which occurred in the year 1546,^^ 
the Reformation had gained a strong foothold in most of the- 
countries of Western Christendom, save in Spain and Italy, and 
even in these parts the new doctrines had made some progress. 
But several causes now conspired to check the hitherto trium- 
phant advance of Protestantism and to enable the old Church to 
regain much of the ground that had been lost. Chief among 

12 After the death of Luther the leadership of the Reformation in Germany fell 
to Philip Melanchthon (1497-1560), one of Luther's friends and fellow-workers. 
Melanchthon's disposition was exactly the opposite of Luther's. He often reproved 
Luther for his indiscretion and vehemence, and was constantly laboring to effect, 
through mutual concessions, a reconciliation between the CathoUcs and Protestants. 



DIVISIONS AMONG PROTESTANTS 



309 



these were the divisions among the Protestants, the Counter- 
Reform in the Catholic Church, the increased activity of the 
Inquisition, the rise of the Society of the Jesuits, and Spain's 
zealous championship of Catholicism. 

332. Divisions among the Protestants Early in their contest 

with the Roman see the Protestants became divided into three 
mutually hostile sects, — Lutherans, Zwinglians, and Calvinists. 

The creed of the Lutherans came to prevail very generally in 
North Germany, and was received in Denmark, Norway, and 
Sweden. It also spread into the Netherlands, but there it was 
soon overshadowed by Calvinism. Of all the Protestant sects the 
Lutherans made the least departure from the Catholic Church. 

The Zwinglians, followers of Huldreich Zwingli (1484-1531), 
differed from the Lutherans particularly in their views regarding 
the Eucharist and in the mat- 
ter of church organization. 
Their creed became dominant 
in the greater part of German 
Switzerland, and from there 
spread into Southern Ger- 
many. 

The Calvinists were follow- 
ers of John Calvin (1509- 
1564), a Frenchman by birth, 
who, forced to flee from 
France on account of per- 
secution, found a refuge at 
Geneva,^^ which city he made 
the center of a movement even 
more extended and historic- 
ally important than that having its point of departure at Witten- 
berg. We can best remember the wide range of Calvinism and its 

13 Under the influence of Calvin, Geneva became a sort of theocratic state, with 
the reformer as a Protestant pope. The laws and regulations of this little city-state 
recall those of the later Puritan commonwealth in England. Calvinism was every- 
where the same. It was a sort of revival of the theocracy of the ancient Hebrews. 
Calvin has been well called the " Prophet of the Old Covenant." 




Fig. 58. — John Calvin. (After 
a painting by Holbein) 



3IO BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

remarkable influence upon the history of the sixteenth and seven- 
teenth centuries by keeping in mind that the French Huguenots, 
the Scotch Covenanters, the Dutch Netherlanders (in large part), 
the English Puritans, and the Pilgrim Fathers were all Calvinists.^* 

These great Protestant communions finally broke up into a 
large number of denominations or churches, each holding to 
some minor point of doctrine or adhering to some form of wor- 
ship disregarded by the others, yet all agreeing in the central 
doctrine of the Reformation, " justification by faith alone." 

Now, the contentions between these different sects were sharp 
and bitter. The liberal-minded reformer had occasion to lament 
the same state of things as that which troubled the Apostle Paul 
in the early days of Christianity. One said, I am of Luther ; 
another said, I am of Calvin ; and another said, I am of Zwingli. 
Even Luther himself denounced Zwingli as a heretic; and the 
Calvinists would have no deahngs with the Lutherans. 

The influence of these sectarian strifes and divisions upon the 
progress of the reform movement was most disastrous. They 
weakened the Protestant party in the presence of a united and 
vigilant enemy. They afforded the Catholics a strong and 
effective argument against the entire movement as tending to 
uncertainty and discord. 

333. The Catholic Counter-Reform ; the Council of Trent (1545- 
1563); Carlo Borromeo. — As we have seen, it was the existence 
of acknowledged evils and scandals in the old Church that had 
contributed greatly to undermine its authority and to weaken its 
hold upon the reverence and the consciences of men. It was the 
correction of these evils and the removal of these scandals which 
did much to restore its lost influence and authority. 

This reform, which even before the rise of Protestantism had 
already begun within the Catholic Church, was carried out in 
great measure by the memorable Council of Trent (i 545-1 563). 

14 All these are great names in the history of folitical liberty. The undeniably 
favorable influence of Calvinism upon civil liberty is doubtless to be attributed not 
so much to its creed as to the democratic constitution of the Calvinistic churches. 
Each church forms a little democracy, and naturally ecclesiastical democracy has 
fostered political democracy. 



THE CATHOLIC COUNTER-REFORM 311 

This body, the most important Church assembly since that of 
Nicsea, a.d. 325, with the voice of authority passed upon all the 
points that had been raised by the reformers. It declared the tra- 
ditions of the Church to be of equal authority with the Bible ; it 
reasserted the divine character of the Papacy ; it condemned as 
heresy the Lutheran doctrine of justification by faith alone. It 
made everything so clear that no one, not even a wayfaring man, 
need err either in doctrine or in duty. It also demanded that 
the lives of all priests and bishops should be an exemplification 
of Christian purity and morality. 

These measures of the council helped greatly to check the 
Protestant movement. The correction of the abuses that had had 
so much to do in causing the great schism, smoothed the way for 
the return to the ancient Church of thousands who had become 
alarmed at the dangers into which society seemed to drift when 
once it cast loose from anchorage in the safe harbor of tradition 
and authority. 

The spirit in which the Council of Trent had done its work 
finds illustration in the exalted character and devoted life of 
the Italian reformer. Carlo Borromeo (15 38-1 5 88). In him the 
reforming spirit of the great council was incarnate. He became 
Archbishop of Milan, and took as his model the holy Ambrose, 
who, twelve centuries before, in the corrupt times of the failing 
Roman Empire, had won sainthood in that same see. He reno- 
vated and restored the desecrated and deserted churches, reformed 
the lax and dissolute lives of the clergy, restored discipline in the 
religious orders, and established schools and colleges. It was due 
largely to his zealous labors and to the happy contagion of his 
holy example that a new spiritual life was created in Milan and 
the regions round about, that popular veneration for the ancient 
Church was again evoked, that the progress of Protestantism in 
Italy was stayed, and that the wavering were held firm in their 
allegiance to the Papacy and many who had already been led away 
by the Protestant heresy were brought back to the ancient fold. 

334. The Inquisition. — The Catholic Church, having purified 
itself and defined clearly its articles of faith, demanded of all 



312 



BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 



a more implicit obedience than hitherto. The Inquisition now 
assumed new vigor and activity, and heresy was sternly dealt 
with. The tribunal was assisted in the execution of its sentences 
by the secular authorities in all the Romance countries, but 
outside of these it was not generally recognized by the temporal 
princes, though it did succeed in establishing itself for a time in 
the Netherlands and in some parts of Germany. Death, usually 
by burning, and loss of property were the penalty of obstinate 
heresy. Without doubt the Inquisition did much to check the 
advance of the Reformation in Southern Europe, aiding especially 
in holding Italy and Spain obedient to the ancient Church. 

At this point, in connection with the persecutions of the Inquisi- 
tion, we should not fail to recall that in the sixteenth century a 
refusal to conform to the estabhshed worship was regarded by the 
great majority of Protestants, as well as of CathoHcs, as a species 
of treason against society, and was dealt with accordingly. Thus 
at Geneva we find Calvin bending all his energies to the trial and 

execution of Servetus, because 
he published views that the 
Calvinists thought heretical; 
and in England we see the 
Anglican Protestants waging 
the most cruel, bitter, and per- 
sistent persecutions, not only 
against the Catholics, but also 
against all Protestants who 
refused to conform to the 
Estabhshed Church. 

335. The Society of the 
Jesuits ; Ignatius of Loyola ; 
Francis Xavier. — The Society 
of the Jesuits, or the Company 
of Jesus, was another most 
powerful auxiliary concerned in the reestablishment of the threat- 
ened authority of the papal see. The founder Of the fraternity was 
Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), a native of Spain. Ignatius 




Fig. 59. — Ignatius of Loyola 
(After a painting by Rubens) 



IGNATIUS LOYOLA 313 

was the embodiment of Spanish rehgious zeaL His object was to 
form a society the devotion and energy of whose members should 
meet the ardor and activity of the reformers. The new society 
was instituted by a papal bull in 1540. 

Ignatius before he became a priest was a soldier, and it was 
this circumstance which lent a military cast to his society. Indeed, 
the mihtary principle so characterizes it that it has been described 
as "a military organization for religious purposes." This pre- 
dominance of the military principle in the society should be borne 
carefully in mind in any study of the character and the activity 
of the Jesuits. Like the soldier, each member of the society is 
required to submit his own will to that of his superior, and is taught 
to regard self-renunciation and obedience as cardinal virtues. 

It was particularly as educators that the Jesuits made their influ- 
ence felt upon society. Their aim here was to fill the world with 
schools and colleges, just as a conquered country might be occu- 
pied with military garrisons. Ignatius left behind him a full hun- 
dred colleges and seminaries ; within a century and a half after his 
death the order had founded over seven hundred. 

As the well-discipHned, watchful, and uncompromising foes of 
the Protestants, now divided into many and often hostile sects, 
the Jesuits did so much to bring about a reaction that Macaulay 
declares, " The history of the Jesuits is the history of the Catholic 
Reaction." It was largely through their direct or indirect agency 
that Hungary, Poland, Bohemia, and South Germany, after they 
had been invaded by Protestantism and in a greater or less 
degree drawn away from the old faith, were won back to the 
Catholic Church and again bound by stronger ties than ever to 
the Papacy. By the end of the sixteenth century this great work 
of recovery had been in the main accomplished. This regaining 
of these debatable countries for Catholicism constitutes one of the 
most important matters in the religious history of Europe. 

And not only did the labors of the Jesuits contribute thus 
greatly to the retrieving of the papal fortunes in Europe, but they 
were also instrumental in extending the authority and spreading 
the doctrines of the Catholic Church into all other parts of the 



314 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

world. Most distinguished of all the missionaries of the society 
to pagan lands was the saintly Francis Xavier (1506-15 5 2), 
known as the " Apostle of the Indies." His charity was meas- 
ureless, his courage heroic. He thought that he should be as 
ready to face danger in quest of souls as others were in quest of 
" aromatic groves and mines of gold." His labors in India, Japan, 
and other lands of the Far East were attended with astonishing 
results. 

336. Spain's Zealous Championship of Catholicism. — Just as 
England became the champion and the bulwark of Protestantism, 
so did Spain become the champion and the bulwark of Catholi- 
cism. The Spanish sovereigns, as we shall see, constituted them- 
selves the guardians of Catholic orthodoxy, and put forth all their 
strength to uproot the reformed faith not only in their own domains 
but also in other lands. Their strenuous efforts to reestablish the 
old religious unity caused them to become most important instru- 
ments of the Catholic Restoration. 

337. The Hundred Years of Religious Wars. — The action taken 
by the Council of Trent made impossible a reconciliation between 
the tvvo parties. The middle of the sixteenth century had not yet 
been reached before the increasing bitterness of their controversy 
led to an appeal to force. Then followed a hundred years of 
religious wars. During this time neither party laid aside the 
sword. The Schmalkaldic War in Germany between Charles V 
and the Protestant princes, the fierce struggle in the Netherlands 
between Philip II of Spain and his revolted subjects, the Hugue- 
not wars in France, the launching of the Spanish Armada against 
Protestant England, the Thirty Years' War in Germany, — all 
these were simply different acts of the long and terrible drama. 
In this protracted combat Protestantism was fighting desperately 
for the right to live; the Papacy was fighting to put down 
secession, to force the seceded states back into the old ecclesias- 
tical empire, to restore the broken unity of Christendom. 

In the chapters immediately following this we shall trace in 
broad outline the vicissitudes in the fortunes of the rival creeds 
in the leading European countries. To what we have here said 



OUTCOMES OF THE REVOLT 315 

concerning the beginnings of the Revolution we will in a closing 
paragraph add only a single word touching its results. 

338. Outcomes of the Revolt. — The outcome of the Protes- 
tant Revolution as a revolution was, very broadly stated, the sep- 
aration from the Catholic Church of North Germany, Denmark, 
Norway, Sweden, England, and Scotland, along with ' parts of 
Switzerland and of the Netherlands, — in the main, nations of 
Teutonic race. The great Romance nations, namely, France, 
Spain, and Italy, together with South Germany, Poland, Bohemia, 
Hungary, and Ireland, adhered to the ancient Church, or, if for 
a period shaken in their loyalty, ultimately returned to their old 
allegiance.'^^ 

What this separation from Rome meant in the political realm 
is well stated by Seebohm : " It was the claiming by the civil 
power in each nation of those rights which the Pope had hitherto 
claimed within it as head of the great ecclesiastical empire. The 
clergy and monks had hitherto been regarded more or less as 
foreigners, — that is, as subjects of the Pope's ecclesiastical empire. 
Where there was a revolt from Rome the allegiance of these per- 
sons to the Pope was annulled, and the civil power claimed as full 
a sovereignty over them as it had over its lay subjects. Matters 
relating to marriage and wills still for the most part remained 
under ecclesiastical jurisdiction, but then, as the ecclesiastical 
courts themselves became national courts arid ceased to be Roman 
or papal, all these matters came under the control of the civil 
power." 

In a word, the secession meant that the nations thus breaking 
the ties which formerly united them to Rome now became — 
what they were not during mediaeval times — absolutely inde- 
pendent or sovereign powers, self-centered and self-governed in 
their ecclesiastical as well as in their political life. 

In a spiritual or religious point of view, this severance by the 
northern nations of the bonds that formerly united them to the 

15 It is because the Reformation was espoused so generally by the Teutonic peoples 
and Catholicism adhered to so generally by the Latin nations that Protestantism is 
sometimes spoken of as Teutonic Christianity and Catholicism as Latin Christianity. 



3l6 BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 

ecclesiastical empire of Rome meant a transfer of their allegiance 
from the Chui-ch to the Bible. The decrees of popes and the 
decisions of Church councils were no longer to be regarded as 
having divine and binding force ; the Scriptures alone were to 
be held as possessing divine and infallible authority, and, the- 
oretically, this rule and standard of faith and practice each 
individual was to interpret for himself. 

Another important result of the Reformation was a certain 
impulse given the world in the direction of religious toleration. 
It is true that the reformers, in spite of their insistence for them- 
selves upon the right of private judgment in religious matters, 
did not in practice concede this right to others, and when they 
had the power became, very inconsistently, most zealous perse- 
cutors. They believed with the Catholics that heresy should be 
punished, only they defined heresy differently. Throughout the 
sixteenth century intolerance, in the words of the historian Lin- 
gard, was '^a part of the public law of Christendom." Never- 
theless the proclamation of the principle of private judgment in 
religious affairs, through a logical necessity, came ultimately to 
exert a favorable influence upon toleration ; for you cannot 
accord to a man the right to form his own judgment respecting 
a matter and at the same time affix a penalty to his reaching 
any save a prescribed conclusion. Consequently among the vari- 
ous agencies, such as modern science, the advance of the world 
in general intelligence, and closer intercourse among the nations, 
which during the past three centuries have brought in the benefi- 
cent principle of rehgious toleration, the Reformation of the 
sixteenth century must be given a prominent place. 



Selections from the Sources. — First Principles of the Reformation 
(ed. by Wace and Buchheim). Read Luther's "Address to the Nobility of 
the German Nation." The address makes a vivid revelation, not only of 
the religious situation in Germany at this time, but also of the character 
of the man who here makes himself the spokesman of the German nation. 
Whitcomb, Literary Source-Book of the German Renaissance. Historical 
Leaflets (Crozer Theological Seminary, Chester, Penn.), No. 2, " Tetzel's 
Theses on Indulgences." Translations and Reprints^ vol. ii, No. 6, *' Period 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 317 

of the Early Reformation in Germany" (ed. by James Harvey Robinson and 
Merrick Whitcomb) ; and vol. iii, No. 3, " Period of the Later Reformation " 
(ed. by Merrick Whitcomb). 

Secondary Works. — Seebohm, The Oxford Reformers. A volume of 
rare freshness and charm on the fellow-work and influence of the Oxford 
reformers, — Colet, Erasmus, and More. Beard, Martin Luther and the 
Reformation in Germany (to 1520). Kostlin, Life of Luther. Emerton, 
Desiderius Erasmus. For a wider survey, from the Protestant point of 
view, of the reform movement : Fisher, The Reformation ; Hausser, The 
Period of the Reformation; and Seebohm, The Era of the Protestant Revo- 
lution. For the history of the movement from the Catholic side : Spal- 
ding, The History of the Protestant Reformation ; and Alzog, Universal 
Church History, vol. iii, pp. 1-460. Henderson, A Short History of Ger- 
many, vol. i, chaps, x-xvi. Janssen, History of the German People at the 
Close of the Middle Ages, vols, iii and iv. The Cambridge Modern History, 
vol. i, chap, xix, and vol. ii, chaps, iv-viii. Whitcomb, A History of Modern 
Europe, pp. 33-64. Robinson, An Introduction to the History of Western 
Europe, chaps, xxv and xxvi. Froude, Lectures on the Council of Trent. 
Hughes, Loyola and the Educational System of the Jesicits. Symonds, The 
Catholic Reaction, vol. i. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Erasmus and his Praise of Folly. 2. John 
Reuchlin. 3. Luther at the Diet of Worms. 4. Melanchthon. 5. Calvin 
and Servetus. 6. Carlo Borromeo. 7. Ignatius of Loyola. 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN; HER RELATION TO THE 
CATHOLIC REACTION 



I. Reign of the Emperor Charles V (15 19-15 56) 

339. Charles' Dominions. — In the year 1500 there was born in 

the city of Ghent, in the Netherlands, a prince who was destined 
to play a great part in the history of the sixteenth century. This 
was Charles, son of PhiHp the Handsome, Archduke of Austria, 

and Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand 
and Isabella of Spain, — later to 
be known to fame as the Emperor 
Charles V. 

Charles was "the converging 
point and heir of four great royal 
lines, which had become united 
by a series of happy matrimonial 
alliances." These were the houses 
of Austria, Burgundy, Castile, and 
Aragon. Before Charles had com- 
pleted his nineteenth year there 
were heaped upon his head, 
through the removal by death of 
his ancestors, the crowns of the 
four dynasties. 

But great as was the number of the hereditary crowns of the 
young prince, there was straightway added to them (in 15 19), 
by the vote of the Electors of Germany, the crown of the Holy 
Roman Empire. After this election he was known as the Emperor 
Charles V; hitherto he had borne the title of Carlos I of Spain. 

318 




Fig. 60. — Emperor Charles V 
(After a painting by Holbein) 



BALANCE OF POWER DISTURBED BY SPAIN 319 

340. The Balance of Power is disturbed by Spain. — When 
Charles VIII of France, just at the close of the Middle Ages, 
made his memorable invasion of Italy, the other states became 
alarmed lest France should gain an undue weight in European 
affairs, and to prevent this formed an alliance to keep France 
within her proper boundaries (sec. 240). This was practically the 
origin of the celebrated system of the balance of power among 
the European states.^ 

From that time to the present this balance of power idea has 
lain at the bottom of much European diplomacy. It has been 
the concern of statesmen to see to it that no one of the nations 
should acquire an overweight of power or influence, and thereby 
endanger the independence of the others. But notwithstanding 
this interested vigilance there has been a constant tendency to a 
disturbance of the equilibrium of the European system of states 
through the overgrowth of this or that member of it. Thus in 
the seventeenth century France under Louis XIV, and then again 
in the early years of the nineteenth century under Napoleon, 
acquired such an ascendancy as to imperil the liberties of the 
continent. The alliances formed, treaties solemnly sworn to, 
and wars fought to prevent such disturbances of the balance of 
power or to restore the equilibrium already impaired, make up 
a great part of the political history of Europe in modern times. 

Now, in the sixteenth century it was the overshadowing great- 
ness of Spain that aroused the fears of Europe. Her preponder- 
ance disturbed alarmingly the equilibrium of the European system, 
and this very largely determined the policies and actions of the 
other states. Here we have the key to much of the political his- 
tory of the reign of the Emperor Charles V and of that of his son 
and successor on the Spanish throne, Philip II. 

341. Charles and the Reformation. — But important as is the 
poHtical side of Charles' reign, it is his relation to the Lutheran 

1 There was, however, no general official recognition of such a doctrine until 1668, 
when the Triple Alliance (Sir William Temple's Treaty) was formed between the 
English, the Dutch, and the Swedes to prevent Louis XIV from making himself 
master of the Low Countries. 



320 THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 

movement which constitutes for us the significant feature of his 
life and work. Fortunately for the Catholic Church, the young 
Emperor placed himself at the head of the Catholic party, and 
not only during his own reign employed the strength and resources 
of his empire in extirpating the heresy of the reformers, but also 
transmitted this policy to his successors upon the Spanish throne. 
Charles, in declaring for the old faith and against the new, 
was swayed both by conviction and by considerations of policy. 
Although suspicious and jealous of the Papacy, he was strongly 
attached to the Catholic Church and creed, and sincerely be- 
lieved that the first duty of a prince was to uproot heresy in 
his dominions. Then, again, as head of the Empire, Charles was 
impelled in the same direction. For he held the prevalent view 
of his age, that no state could tolerate two creeds, that political 
unity required religious unity ; and this maxim he applied not only 
to Spain and his other hereditary possessions, but to his dominions 
as a whole, and, as we shall see, tried to suppress the reformed 
faith in Germany as well as elsewhere. 

342. His Two Chief Enemies. — Had Charles been free from 
the outset to devote all his energies to the work of suppressing the 
Lutheran heresy, it is difficult to see what could have. saved the 
reform doctrines within his dominions from extirpation. But, 
fortunately for the cause of the reformers, Charles' attention, 
during all the first part of his reign, was drawn away from the 
serious consideration of Church questions by the attacks upon his 
dominions of two of the most powerful monarchs of the times, — 
Francis I (15 15-1547) of France, and Solyman the Magnificent 
(15 20-1566), Sultan of Turkey. Time and again, when Charles 
was inclined to proceed to severe measures against the Protestant 
princes of Germany, the threatening movements of one or both 
of these enemies, at times acting in concert and alliance, forced 
him to postpone his proposed crusade against heretics for a 
campaign against foreign foes. 

343. Rivalry and Wars between Charles and Francis (1521- 
1544). — Francis I was the rival of Charles in the contest for the 
imperial dignity. When the Electors of Germany conferred the 



WARS BETWEEN CHARLES AND FRANCIS 321 

title upon the Spanish monarch, Francis was sorely disappointed, 
and during all the remainder of his reign kept up a jealous and 
almost incessant warfare with Charles, whose enormous posses- 
sions now nearly surrounded the French kingdom. Italy was the 
field of much of the fighting, as the securing of dominion in that 
peninsula was a chief aim of each of the rivals.^ 

What is known as the First War between Francis and the 
Emperor broke out in 1521.^ The war was full of misfortunes for 
Francis. His army was driven out of Northern Italy by the imperial 
forces; his most skillful and trusted commander, the Constable 
Bourbon, turned traitor and went over to Charles ; and another 
of his most valiant nobles, the celebrated Chevalier Bayard, the 
knight sans peur et sans reproche^ " without fear and without 
reproach," was killed ; while, to crown all, Francis, who had led a 
large army into Italy to retrieve his misfortunes, was, after suffer- 
ing a crushing defeat at Pavia, wounded and taken prisoner (1525). 
In a letter to his mother informing her of the disaster, he wrote, 
" Nothing is left me in all the world save honor and life." ^ He 
was liberated by the Peace of Madrid (1526). 

The most memorable incident of the Second War between 
Francis and the Emperor was the sack of Rome by an imperial 
army, made up chiefly of Lutherans. Rome had not witnessed 
such scenes since the terrible days of the Goths and Vandals. 

2 Table of Wars 

First War (ended by Peace Third War (ended by Truce 

of Madrid) 1521-1526 of Nice) 1536-1538 

Second War (ended by Fourth War (ended by Peace 

Ladies' Peace) . . . 1527-1529 of Crespy) 1542-1544 

3 Before beginning the war Francis cast about for an ally. The young king of 
England, Henry VIII, seemed the most desirable friend. He accordingly invited 
Henry to a conference in France, at which was to be considered the matter of an 
alliance against the Emperor. The two kings, each attended by a magnificent train 
of courtiers, met near Calais (1520). The meeting is known in history as " The Field 
of the Cloth of Gold," because of the prodigal richness of the costumes and appoint- 
ments of the chiefs and their attendants. " Many," says a contemporary writer, 
" bore thither their mills, their forests, and their meadows on their backs." Nothing 
came of the interview, and Charles finally won Henry over to his side. 

^ From this message comes the laconic saying, " All is lost save honor." 



322 



THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 



In the Third War Francis shocked all Christendom by forming 
an alliance with the Turkish Sultan, who ravaged with his fleets 
the Italian coasts and sold his plunder in the port of Marseilles. 
Francis defended his course by saying that when wolves attacked 
his flock he had a right to set the dogs upon them. The tremen- 
dous outcry caused by this alliance between a Christian king and 
the infidel Sultan, whereas now it is thought the most natural thing 
in the world for Christian governments, following purely commer- 
cial or political interests alone, to become allies of the Sublime 
Porte, illustrates how times have changed and men with them. 

The Fourth War, the last between the rivals, resulted in noth- 
ing decisive for either side, and the struggle was ended by the 
Peace of Crespy (1544). 

344. Results of the Wars between Francis and Charles. — The 
direct and indirect consequences of the protracted combat between 
Francis and Charles were many and far-reaching. 

First, Francis' opposition to Charles had prevented him from 
reducing France to a mere dependency of Spain and from crush- 
ing the political and religious liberties of Germany, and had 
thereby prevented him from destroying the European equilibrium 
and setting up on the Continent an Austro-Spanish tyranny. 

Second, Protestantism had been given time to intrench itself 
so firmly in North Germany and in other countries as to render 
ineffectual all later efforts for its destruction. 

Third, by preventing united action on the part of the Christian 
princes, and by encouraging shameful alliances between Christian 
and Moslem, these quarrels had really been the occasion of the 
severe losses which Christendom during this period suffered at the 
hands of the Ottoman Turks. Hungary had been ravaged with 
fire and sword ; Rhodes had been captured and the Mediterranean 
made almost a Turkish lake.® 

5 The worst feature of tliis advance of the Sultan's authority in the Mediterranean 
was the growth, under his protection, of the power of the Algerian pirates. One of 
the chief strongholds of the pirates on the African coast was Tunis, which was held 
by the famous Barbarossa. In the interval between his second and third wars with 
Francis, Charles, with a large army and fleet, made an assault upon this place, 
defeated the corsair, and set free 20,000 Christian captives. 



PERSECUTION OF THE WALDENSES 323 

Fourth, these wars, having had Italy as their chief theater, had 
been a frightful scourge to that land and had blighted there all the 
fair promises of the Renaissance ; but at the same time the storm 
had wafted the precious seeds of the revived arts and letters beyond 
the mountains into France and other northern lands. The French 
Renaissance dates from these Italian wars. 

345. Persecution of the Waldenses by Francis (1545). — It was 
the religious situation that had much to do in leading Charles 
and Francis to compose their quarrel by the Peace of Crespy. 
The treaty contained secret articles in which each agreed to aid 
the other and to cooperate with other Catholic sovereigns in the 
extirpation of heresy and in the maintenance of the religious unity 
of Christendom. From this time on to the end of their respective 
reigns both were chiefly busied in carrying into effect this secret 
agreement. 

The severest blow dealt the heretics of his kingdom by Francis 
fell upon the Vaudois, or Waldenses,^ the simple, inoffensive inhab- 
itants of a number of hamlets in the Alpine regions of Piedmont 
and Provence. These people during the later mediaeval time had 
fallen into what the Church regarded as heretical ways, and just 
now they were mingling with their own heresies those of the 
Protestant reformers. Thousands were put to death by the sword, 
thousands more were burned at the stake. At a later time other 
persecutions fell upon them, until finally only a miserable rem- 
nant, who found an asylum among the mountains, were left to 
hand down their faith to modern times. 

346. Charles' "Wars with the Protestant German Princes. — 
Charles, on his part, turned his attention to the reformers in Ger- 
many. Inspired by the religious motives and convictions of which 
we have already spoken, and apprehensive, further, of the effect 
upon his authority in Germany of the growth there of such an 
empire within an empire as the Protestant princes and free cities 
— now united in a union known as the Schmalkaldic League — 
were becoming, he resolved to crush the whole reform movement. 

6 So called from the founder of the sect, Peter Waldo, or Pierre de Vaux^ who 
lived in the later years of the twelfth century. 



324 THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 

Accordingly, in the very year that Luther died (1546), the 
Erhperor, aided by the German Catholics, attacked the Protestant 
league. He was at first successful, but in the end the war proved 
the most disastrous and humiliating to him of any in which he 
had engaged. Severe defeats of his armies finally constrained him 
to give up his undertaking to make all his German subjects think 
alike in matters of religion. 

347. The Religious Peace of Augsburg (1555). — In the cele- 
brated Diet of Augsburg, convened in 1555 to compose the dis- 
tracted affairs of the German states, it was arranged and agreed 
that every prince should be allowed to choose between the Cath- 
olic religion and the Augsburg Confession,^ and should have the 
right to make his religion the reHgion of his people.^ This, it 
will be noted, was simply toleration as concerns princes or gov- 
ernments. The people individually had no freedom of choice; 
every subject must follow his prince, and think and believe as he 
thought and believed. 

To this article, however, the Diet made one important excep- 
tion. The Catholics insisted that ecclesiastical princes, i.e. bishops 
and abbots, on becoming Protestants, should give up their offices 
and revenues ; and this important clause, under the name of the 
Ecclesiastical Reservation, was finally made a part of the treaty. 

It is important that this Treaty of Augsburg should be kept 
carefully in mind, for the reason that it was through mutual mis- 
understandings of its provisions and violations of its articles by 
both parties that the way was paved for the terrible Thirty Years' 
War (Chapter XXV). 

348. Charles sets up the Inquisition in the Netherlands. — In 
the Low Countries Charles had a fi:eer hand in dealing with 
heresy than he had in Germany, since in these provinces he exer- 
cised the authority of an hereditary prince and could employ 
measures of repression which he could not resort to in the 

"i The Augsburg Confession, it -will be recalled, was the formula of belief of the 
adherents of Luther (sec. 330). The Peace of Augsburg made no provision for the 
Calvinists (sec. 332), since there were then few of them in Germany. 

8 The free imperial cities were not given this right. Within them each party mus.i; 
tolerate the other. 



ABDICATION OF CHARLES 325 

German states. Accordingly we find him in the year 1550 setting 
up the Inquisition here and sustaining it with all his authority. 
Concerning the results of his efforts we shall speak a little farther 
on (sec. 399). 

349. His Abdication. — While the Diet of Augsburg was arrang- 
ing the religious peace, the Emperor Charles was enacting the part 
of a second Diocletian. There had long been forming in his mind 
the purpose of spending his last days in monastic seclusion. The 
disappointing issue of his contest with the Protestant princes of 
Germany, the weight of advancing years, together with menacing 
troubles which began "to thicken like dark clouds about the 
evening of his reign," now led the Emperor to carry this resolu- 
tion into effect. Accordingly he abdicated in favor of his son 
Philip the crown of the Netherlands^ (i555)> ^^^ that .of Spain 
and its colonies (1556), and then retired to the monastery of 
Yuste, situated in a secluded region in Western Spain. 

The departure of the self-deposed monarch from Ghent to the 
place of his exile is thus contrasted, by the pen of a graceful his- 
torian, with his embarkation from the Netherlands more than a 
third of a century before, to receive the crown of Spain and the 
Indies, which had just descended to him by the death of his 
grandfather Ferdinand : " He was then in the morning of life : 
just entering on a career as splendid as ever opened to young 
ambition. How different must have been the reflections which 
now crowded on his mind, as, with wasted health, and spirits 
sorely depressed, he now embarked on the same voyage ! He had 
run the race of glory, had won the prize, and found that all was 
vanity. He was now returning to the goal whence he had started, 
anxious only to reach some quiet spot where he might lay down 
his weary limbs and be at rest " (Prescott). 

There is a tradition which tells how Charles, after vainly en- 
deavoring to make some clocks that he had about him at Yuste 



9 Philip had received the crown of Naples the preceding year (1554), in order that 
his titular dignity might be the same as that of Queen Mary of England, to whom he 
was that year united in marriage. The imperial crown went to Charles' brother, the 
Archduke Ferdinand. 



326 



THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 



run together, made the following reflection: *'How foolish I have 
been to think I could make all men believe alike about religion, 
when here I cannot make even two clocks keep the same time." 
This story is probably mythical. Charles seems never to have 
doubted either the practicability or the policy of securing uni- 
formity of behef by force. While in retirement at Yuste he 
expressed the deepest regret that he did not burn Luther at 
Worms. He was constantly urging Philip to use greater severity in 
dealing with his heretic subjects, and could scarcely restrain him- 
self from leaving his retreat in order to engage personally in the 
work of eradicating the pestilent doctrines which he heard were 
spreading in Spain, 



11. Spain under Philip II (15 56-1 598) 

350. Philip's Character and his Principles of Government. — 

Philip, unlike his father, was a representative Spaniard. He typi- 
fied and embodied in himself the traits, ideals, and aspirations 
of the Spanish race, just as Luther typified and embodied those of 

the German race. His mind was the 
mind, his conscience was the con- 
science, of the Spanish people. 

Like the true Spaniard, PhiUp 
possessed a deeply religious nature. 
~He believed as sincerely as ever did 
the Puritan Cromwell that he was 
God's chosen instrument for the 
working out of his eternal designs. 
But in order that he might do what 
God would have done in the world, 
he conceived it to be necessary that 
he should have absolute power. A 
necessary basis of this absolute 
power, in Philip's conception, as in 
that of his father Charles, was religious unity. Disunion in the 
Church meant disunion in the state. Hence one of Philip's 




Fig. 61. — Philip 11. (After 
a painting by Titian) 



PHILIP'S DOMAINS AND REVENUES 327 

instruments of government was the Inquisition. He employed it 
in the suppression of heresy, not simply because he was a sincere 
Catholic and believed that heresy was willful sin and should be 
sternly dealt with, but primarily because heresy, in his view, was 
rebellion against the state. 

PhiHp possessed unusual administrative ability. He was an 
incessant worker and busied himself with the endless details of 
government. He left nothing to the discretion of others. He did 
everything himself. His secretaries were mere clerks. He him- 
self handled every dispatch. His generals awaited and followed 
his minute orders. He even regulated, or tried to regulate, the 
private affairs of his subjects, — told them how to dress, when 
they might use carriages, and how and where to educate their 
children. Under this system there was in the kingdom but one 
brain to plan and one will to direct. All local freedom and all 
individual initiative were crushed out. This fatally centralized 
system of absolute government Philip bequeathed to his suc- 
cessors, and thus contributed greatly to determine the unhappy 
destiny of the Spanish people. 

351. Philip's Domains and Revenues. — With the abdication 
of Charles V the imperial crown passed out of the Spanish line 
of the House of Hapsburg. Yet the dominions of Philip were 
scarcely less extensive than those over which his father had ruled. 
AH the hereditary possessions of the Spanish crown were of course 
his. Then just before the abdication of his father gave him these 
domains he had become king-consort of England by marriage with 
Mary Tudor; and about the middle of his reign he acquired 
Portugal and added to his empire its rich dependencies in Africa 
and the East Indies. After this accession of territory, Philip's 
sovereignty was owned, it has been estimated, by more than one 
hundred milHon persons, — probably as large a number as the 
Roman Empire contained at the time of its greatest extent. 

Philip's revenues, too, were as ample as his domains. The 
mines of Mexico and Peru poured into the royal coffers a steady 
stream of the precious metals ; the looms of Flanders created 
untold wealth for their Spanish master ; while frequent and heavy 



328 THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 

taxes levied upon the provinces and cities of the peninsula still 
further augmented the royal income. 

But notwithstanding that Philip's dominions were so extensive, 
his resources so enormous, and many of the outward circumstances 
of his reign so striking and brilliant, there were throughout the 
period causes at work which were rapidly undermining the great- 
ness of Spain and preparing her fall. By wasteful wars and extrav- 
agant buildings Philip managed to dissipate the royal treasures ; 
and by a narrow, blind, and suicidal course in regard to his Moorish, 
Jewish, and Protestant subjects, he ruined the industries of the 
most flourishing of the provinces of Spain, and drove the Nether- 
lands into a desperate revolt, which ended in the separation of the 
most valuable of those provinces from the Spanish crown. 

As the most important matters of Philip's reign — namely, his 
war against the revolted Netherlands and his attempt upon Eng- 
land with his "Invincible Armada" — belong properly to the 
respective histories of England and the Netherlands, and will be 
treated of in connection with the affairs of those countries, we 
shall give here very little space to the history of the period. 

352. Philip's War with France. — Philip took up his father's 
quarrel with France. He was aided by the English, who were 
persuaded to this step by their queen, Mary Tudor, now the wife, 
it will be recalled, of Philip. Fortune favored Philip. The French 
were defeated in two great battles,-^" and were forced to agree to 
a treaty (Peace of Gateau- Cambr6sis, 1559) so advantageous to 
Spain as to give Philip great distinction in the eyes of all Europe. 

In the negotiation of this treaty between Philip and Henry, as 
in the Peace of Crespy between Charles and Francis just fifteen 

10 At St. Quentin (1557), an. important town in North France, then again at Grave- 
lines (1558). The monument built by Philip to commemorate the victory of St. Quen- 
tin is strikingly illustrative of his character. Before the battle he vowed to erect 
to St. Lawrence the most splendid monastery the world had ever seen, if he would 
but give success to his arms. Philip kept his vow faithfully. A few years after the 
battle he laid, near the city of Madrid, the foundation of the famous Escorial, — "a 
palace, a monastery, and a mausoleum." The edifice was built in the form of a grid- 
iron, from the circumstance that St. Lawrence suffered martyrdom by being broiled 
on such an instrument. It is the Westminster Abbey of Spain ; it holds the ashes of 
all the Spanish sovereigns from Charles V onward. 



PHILIP'S CRUSADE AGAINST THE MORISCOS 329 

years before, a main motive with both sovereigns was anxiety to 
be free to engage in the work of- extirpating heresy. 

353. Philip's Crusade against the Moriscos (15 70-15 71). — It 
will be recalled that upon the conquest of Granada in 1492 by 
Ferdinand and Isabella, the Moors were assured protection in all 
civil rights and granted religious freedom. Had these promises 
been kept, the Moors, docile and industrious as they were, would 
have become loyal subjects of the Spanish crown, and an element 
of strength in the Spanish nation. 

But the Emperor Charles V had broken faith with them. Carry- 
ing out his policy of enforcing religious uniformity, he compelled 
them to embrace Christianity. They submitted to baptism, and 
outwardly conformed to the requirements of the Church, but 
secretly they held to their own faith, and maintained their ancient 
practices and traditions. Having been baptized, however, they 
were subject to the jurisdiction of the Church. The Inquisition 
dealt cruelly with them as apostates and heretics. 

PhiHp inherited the policy of his father, and was more thorough- 
going in carrying it out He conceived it to be his duty to impose 
upon the Moriscos — thus they were called after their conversion 
— conditions that should thoroughly obhterate all traces of their 
ancient faith and manners. So he issued a decree that they should 
no longer wear their native garb or use their native tongue, and 
that they should give their children Christian names and send them 
to Christian schools. A determined revolt followed. • 

The uprising was suppressed with cruel severity, and then, 
because there was danger that if left in these coast regions they 
might open the gates of the country to the Moslems of the Medi- 
terranean, an order was issued which condemned all the Moriscos 
of Granada to deportation to districts in the center and the north 
of the peninsula. The order was relentlessly carried out. Men, 
women, and children, all who were of Moorish blood, were carried 
off into hopeless exil^. 

354. Defeat of the Turkish Fleet at Lepanto (1571). — At the 
very moment almost that Philip was dealing Spain a fatal blow by 
his cruel treatment of his Morisco subjects, he was rendering a great 



330 THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 

service to Christian civilization at large. This he did by helping 
to stay the progress of the Ottoman Turks in the Mediterranean. 
They had captured the important island of Cyprus, and had 
assaulted the Hospitalers at Malta, which island had been saved 
from falling into the hands of the infidels only by the splendid 
conduct of the Knights. All Christendom was becoming alarmed. 
An alliance was formed, embracing the Pope, the Venetians, and 
Philip II. An immense fleet was equipped and put under the com- 
mand of Don John of Austria, Philip's half-brother, a young gen- 
eral whose consummate abiUty had been recently displayed in the 
crusade against the Moors. 

The Christian fleet met the Turkish squadron in the Gulf of 
Lepanto, on the western coast of Greece. The battle was unequaled 
by anything the Mediterranean had seen since the naval encounters 
of the Romans and Carthaginians in the First Punic War. The 
Ottoman fleet was almost totally destroyed. Thousands of Chris- 
tian captives, who were found chained to the oars of the Turkish 
galleys, were liberated. All Christendom rejoiced as when Jerusa- 
lem was captured by the first crusaders. 

The battle of Lepanto holds an important place in history, 
because it marks the turning point of the long struggle between 
the Mohammedans and Christians, which had now been going 
on for nearly one thousand years. Though the Moslems had 
received many checks, there really was no time previous to this 
great victory when the Mohammedan power, represented first 
by the Arabs and afterwards by the Turks, did not hang like a 
threatening cloud along the southern or eastern border of Chris- 
tendom. The victory of Lepanto robbed the cloud of its terrors. 
The Ottoman Turks, though they afterwards made progress in 
some quarters, never recovered the prestige they lost in that 
disaster, and their power thenceforward steadily declined. 

355. The Acquisition of Portugal by Spain. — When in 1580 
the throne of Portugal became vacant by the death of Dom 
Henry the Cardinal, Philip laid claim to the. kingdom, and sent 
an army, led by the able Duke of Alva, to take possession of the 
country. For sixty years Portugal remained in captivity to Spain. 



DEATH OF PHILIP 33 1 

The significance of this acquisition consisted not so much in 
the extension of Spanish authority throughout the peninsula as in 
the bringing under Spanish control of the colonial possessions of 
Portugal in South America, in Africa, and in the East Indies, for 
this soon made them the spoil of the Dutch and the English, the 
enemies and the commercial rivals of Spain. It was under these 
circumstances that the Dutch, seizing the Spice Islands and other 
former possessions of Portugal, laid the basis of their great empire 
in the Eastern seas, and the EngHsh that of theirs in India. 

356. The Death of Philip (1598). — In the year 1588 Philip 
made his memorable attempt with the so-called " Invincible 
Armada" upon England, at this time the stronghold of Prot- 
estantism. As we shall see a little later, he failed utterly in the 
undertaking. Ten years after this death ended his reign. 

Of the character of Phihp probably no juster estimate has 
ever been made than that found in these words of the Dutch 
historian Blok : " Not until our time has it been made clear that 
in the heart of this politician, full of political cunning, of devilish 
revenge, of low craft, — in the heart of this little-spirited, narrow, 
somber, bitter king, — there were also world-wide thoughts, noble 
feehngs of belief, hearty love, rich artistic feeling, and devotion 
to higher ideals." 

357. Later Events: the Expulsion of the Moriscos (1609- 
16 10); Loss of the Netherlands. — From the death of Philip II 
Spain declined in power, reputation, and influence. This was 
due very largely to the bigotry and tyranny of her rulers. Thus 
under Philip III (1598-162 1) a severe loss, one from which they 
never recovered, was inflicted upon the manufactures and other 
industries of the country by the expulsion of the Moriscos. 

- Philip II, it will be recalled, had deported the whole Morisco 
population of Granada to inland provinces. Now all Spain was to 
be cleared absolutely of the " evil race." Not one was to be left 
upon Spanish soil. Philip really believed that this driving out of 
the misbelievers would be a service pleasing to God, even as was 
the driving out by the Hebrews of the Canaanites from Pales- 
tine. But he was actuated also by other motives in expelling the 



332 THE ASCENDANCY OF SPAIN 

unhappy Moriscos. They were accused, and not without ground, 
so desperate had oppression and persecution rendered them, of 
plotting with their co-reUgionists, the African Moors and the Otto- 
man Turks, for the invasion of Spain, and thus endangering the 
peace and unity of the land. 

Accordingly during the years 1609 and 16 10 all persons of 
Moorish descent — more than half a million of the most intel- 
ligent, skillful, and industrious inhabitants of the peninsula — 
were driven into exile, chiefly to North Africa. The empty 
dwellings and neglected fields of once populous and gardenlike 
provinces told how fatala blow Spain had inflicted upon herself. 
She had achieved rehgious unity — but at a great price. 

At the very moment that Spain was being so deeply wounded 
in the peninsula she received an incurable hurt in her outside 
possessions. In the Truce of 1609 (sec. 412) she was forced 
virtually to recognize the independence of the Protestant Neth- 
erlands, whose revolt against the tyranny of Philip II has been 
mentioned. In the secession of these provinces Spain lost her 
most valuable dependency. 

358. Conclusion. — Spain now disappears as a power of the 
first rank from the stage of history. The historian Laurent finely 
compares her withdrawal from the theater of great affairs to 
Charles V's retirement into the cloistral solitude of Yuste. " In the 
sixteenth century," he says, " Spain shone in the first rank among 
the great powers ; she filled the Old and the New World with her 
name ; then she retired into isolation, as Charles V at the end of 
his agitated life retired within the solitude of a monastery." 

Even the very brief review which we have made of her sixteenth- 
century history will not fail to have revealed at least two of the main 
causes of her failure and quick decadence : first, a false imperial 
policy in Europe which involved her in endless and fruitless wars ; 
and second, political despotism and religious intolerance. . 



Selections from the Sources. — Translations and Reprints, vol. iii. No. 3, 
" Period of the Later Reformation " (ed. by Merrick Whitcomb) ; contains 
short selections bearing on several of the matters covered by this chapter. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



333 



See Brewer, Reign of Henry VIII, vol. ii, pp. 120-126, for accounts by 
eyewitnesses of the sack of Rome by the imperial army in 1527. 

Secondary Works. — Robertson, History of the Reign of the Emperor 
Charles the Fifth. Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip the Second; 
this and the preceding work by Robertson are reckoned among the classics 
of historical literature. Armstrong, The Emperor Charles V. Stirling- 
Maxwell, The Cloister Life of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, and Don 
fohn of Austria ; works combining in a rare degree great learning and 
literary charm. Hume, The Spanish People, chaps, ix-xi; Spain: its Great- 
ness and Decay, and Philip II of Spain. All these are works by an emi- 
nent scholar, and are well adapted to use with classes of young readers. 
Lea, The Moriscos of Spain: their Conversion and Expulsion, Stephens, 
Portugal, chap, xiii; for Portugal's "Sixty Years' Captivity" to Spain. See 
also bibliography for "Chapter XXIII. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Field of the Cloth of Gold. 2. Siege 
of Vienna by the Ottoman Turks (1529). 3. The sack of Rome in 1527. 
4. The Waldenses. 5. The Emperor Charles V at Yuste. 6. The Esco- 
rial, 7. The Expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain. 



CHAPTER XXII 

THE TUDORS AND THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 
(1485-1603) 

I. Introductory 

359. The Tudor Period. — The Tudor period^ in English his- 
tory covers the sixteenth century, and overlaps a httle the preced- 
ing century and also the following. It was an eventful and stirring 
time for the English people. It witnessed among them great prog- 
ress in art, science, and trade, and a literary outburst such as the 
world had not seen since the best days of Athens. But the great 
event of the period was the Reformation. It was under the sov- 
ereigns of this house that England was severed from papal Rome, 
and Protestantism became firmly established in the island. To 
tell how these great results were effected will be our chief aim in 
the present chapter. 

360. The English Reformation first a Revolt and then a Re- 
form ; its Premonitions. — The Reformation in England was, more 
distinctly than elsewhere, a double movement. First, England 
was separated violently from the ecclesiastical empire of Rome, 
but without any essential change being made in creed or form of 
worship. This was accomplished under Henry VIII. 

Second, the EngHsh Church, thus rendered independent of 
Rome, gradually changed its creed and ritual. This was effected 
chiefly under Edward VI. So the movement was first a revolt 
and then a reform. 

In so far as it was a secession movement, it was practically merely 
the culmination of an age-long controversy between England 

1 The Tudor sovereigns were Henry VII (1485-1509), Henry VIII (1509-1547), 
Edward VI (1547-1553), Mary (1553-1558), and Elizabeth (1558-1603). 

334 



REIGN OF HENRY VII 335 

and the Papacy.^ "For three hundred years," in the words of 
the historian Green, " the Pope had been the standing grievance 
of EngUshmen." Time and again the EngHsh Parliament had 
passed acts declaring that the Pope should not do this and should 
not do that in England. It was this sensitiveness of EngUshmen 
respecting the jurisdiction in England of a foreign potentate that 
made it so comparatively easy for Henry VIII, during the first 
stir and excitement of the reform movement, to cut England loose 
from the papal empire. 

In so far as the movement was a religious reformation, the soil 
in England had been in a measure prepared for the seed of the 
reformed faith by the labors of the humanists. We have already 
spoken of the significant movement of the Oxford reformers, 
Colet, Erasmus, and More (sec. 317). 

II. The Reign of Henry VII (1485-1509) 

361. Benevolences ; the Statute of Liveries. — Henry VII and his 
queen united the long-disputed titles of the two Roses (sec. 223). 
But the bitter feelings engendered by the contentions of the rival 
families still existed. Particularly was there much smothered dis- 
content among the Yorkists, which manifested itself in two remark- 
able attempts to place impostors upon the throne, both of which 
however were unsuccessful. 

Henry's besetting sins were avarice and a love of despotic rule. 
Much of his attention was given to heaping up a vast treasure, 
which he left to his successor. One device adopted by the king 
for wringing money from his wealthy subjects was what were 
euphemistically termed " Benevolences." Magna Carta forbade the 
king to impose taxes without the consent of the Common Council. 
But Henry did not like to convene Parliament, as he wished to 
rule like the kings of the Continent, guided simply by his own 
free will. So benevolences were made to take the place of regular 

2 For episodes in this protracted quarrel, see " The Martyrdom of Thomas 
Becket" (sec. 208), ." Pope Innocent III and King John of England" (sec. 164), and 
" The Revolt of Germany and England" (sec. 169). 



336 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

taxes. These were nothing more nor less than gifts extorted from 
the well-to-do by moral pressure. 

One of Henry's favorite ministers, Cardinal Morton, was par- 
ticularly successful in his appeals for gifts of this kind. To those 
who lived splendidly he would say that it was very evident they 
were quite able to make a generous donation to their sovereign ; 
while to others who lived in a narrow and pinched way he would 
represent that their economical mode of life must have made them 
wealthy. This teasing dilemma received the name of " Morton's 
fork." 

The king found still another source of revenue in raking up 
long-forgotten claims of the crown, and in imposing fines for the 
violation- of musty laws that everybody had forgotten. Among 
the various laws executed with unusual rigor, not more to sustain 
the dignity of the crown than to increase its revenues, was one 
known as the Statute of Liveries, which forbade the great lords to 
keep liveried or uniformed retainers. This statute was intended 
to take away from the baronage what little power and importance 
remained to them after the ruin wrought by the Wars of the Roses. 
Henry watched this matter very closely, and greatly increased the 
receipts of the royal exchequer by the enforcement of fines. 

362 . Foreign Matrimonial Alliances. — The marriages of Henry's 
children must be noted by us here, because of the great influence 
these alliances had upon the after course of English history. 

A common fear of France caused Ferdinand and Isabella of 
Spain and Henry to form a protective alliance. To secure the 
permanency of the union it was deemed necessary to cement it by 
a marriage bond. The Infanta Catherine was accordingly betrothed 
to Arthur, Prince of Wales. Unfortunately, the prince died soon 
after the celebration of the nuptials. 

The Spanish sovereigns, still anxious to retain the advantages 
of an English alliance, now urged that the young widow be 
espoused by Arthur's brother Henry. A rule of the Church, how- 
ever, which forbade a man to marry his brother's widow, stood 
in the way of this arrangement; but the queen mother Isabella 
secured from Pope Julius II a decree granting permission in this 



MARITIME DISCOVERIES 337 

case, and so the young widow was betrothed to Prince Henry. 
This alliance of the royal families of England and Spain led to 
many important consequences, as we shall learn. 

- To relieve England of danger on her northern frontier, Henry 
steadily pursued the policy of a marriage alliance with Scotland. 
His wishes were realized when his elder daughter Margaret became 
the wife of James IV, king of that realm. This was a most fortunate 
marriage, and finally led to the happy union of the two countries 
under a single crown. 

363. Maritime Discoveries. — It was during this reign that 
great geographical discoveries enlarged the boundaries of the 
world. Columbus announced to Europe the existence of land to 
the west; Vasco da Gama sailed around the Cape of Good Hope 
and found a water path to the East Indies. 

In the year of this last enterprise Henry commissioned John 
Cabot, a Venetian navigator doing business in England, and his 
sons to make explorations in the western and northern seas. In 
his westward voyage Cabot ran against the American continent 
somewhere in the vicinity of Newfoundland, and took possession 
of the country in the name of the English sovereign (149 7)- He 
was probably the first European to look upon the mainland of the 
New World, for Columbus up to this time had seen only the 
islands of the Gulf of Mexico and of the Caribbean Sea. 

Upon this discovery and other alleged discoveries and explora- 
tions of John Cabot and his son Sebastian the English based 
their claim to the whole of the American coast from Labrador 
down to Florida. This claim included the best part of North 
America, — what was destined to be the third and most spacious 
home of the Anglo-Saxon race. 

III. England severed from the Papacy by 
Henry VIII (i 509-1 547) 

364. Cardinal Wolsey. — Henry VII died in 1509, leaving his 
throne to his son Henry, an energetic and headstrong youth of 
eighteen years. We must here at the opening of the young king's 



338 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

reign ^introduce his greatest minister, Thomas Wolsey (1475?- 
1530). This man was one of the most remarkable characters of 
his generation, — " probably the greatest political genius," says 
Bishop Creighton, " whom England has ever produced." He was, 
as Holinshed characterizes him, " very eloquent, and full of wit ; 
but passingly ambitious." Henry elevated him to the office of 
Archbishop of York, and made him Lord Chancellor of the realm ; 
the Pope made him a cardinal, and afterwards papal legate in 
England. He was now virtually at the head of affairs in both 
State and Church. 

Wolsey was a patriot, — the best patriot of his time. But he 
conceived the great need of England, still feeling the effects of 
the old feudal turbulency, to be a single, strong, firm hand at the 
helm ; hence his first aim was to make the royal power supreme 
and absolute. His second aim was to make England the center 
of European politics, the mediator between the rival powers of 
France, Spain, and the Papacy. He attained in a fair measure 
both these ends ; he enabled Henry to rule as well as to reign, 
and secured for England great prestige in Europe. 

365. Henry as '* Defender of the Faith." — It was in the eighth 
year of Henry VIII's reign that Martin Luther tacked upon the 
door of the Wittenberg church his famous ninety-five theses. 
England was stirred with the rest of Western Christendom. 
When, a little later, Luther attacked directly the papal power, 
Henry wrote a Latin treatise refuting the arguments of the auda- 
cious monk. 

The Pope, Leo X, rewarded Henry's Catholic zeal by confer- 
ring upon him the title of "Defender of the Faith" (152 1). 
This title was retained by Henry after the secession of the Church 
of England from the papal see, and is borne by his latest successor 

3 In 1512, joining what was known as the Holy League, — a union against the 
French king, of which the Pope was the head, — Henry made his first campaign in 
France. While Henry was across the Channel, James IV of Scotland thought to 
give aid to the French king by invading England. The Scottish army was met by 
the English force at Flodden, beneath the Cheviot Hills, and completely overwhelmed 
(15 13). King James was killed, and the flower of the Scottish nobility was left dead 
upon the field. It was the most terrible disaster that had ever befallen the Scottish 
nation. Scott's poem Marmion, a Tale of Flodden Field, commemorates the battle. 



HENRY SEEKS DIVORCE FROM CATHERINE 339 

to-day, although he is "defender" of quite a different faith from 
that in the defense of which Henry first earned the title. 

366. Henry seeks to be divorced from Catherine. — We have now 
to relate some circumstances which very soon changed Henry 
from a zealous supporter of the Papacy into a bitter enemy. 
Henry's marriage with Catherine of Aragon had been prompted 




Fig. 62. — Henry VIII. (After a painting by Holbein) 

by policy and not by love. Of the five children born of the union, 
all had died save a sickly daughter named Mary. In these suc- 
cessive afflictions which left him without a son to succeed him, 
Henry saw or feigned to see' a sign of Heaven's displeasure 
because he had taken to wife the widow of his brother. And now 
a new circumstance arose, if it had not existed for some time 
previous to this. Henry fell in love with Anne Boleyn, a beauti- 
ful and vivacious maid of honor in the queen's household. This 
new affection so greatly quickened the king's conscience that he 



340 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

soon became fully convinced that it was his duty to put Catherine 
aside. Accordingly Henry asked the Pope, Clement VII, to grant 
him a divorce. Clement gave no immediate decision, but after 
about two years' delay, influenced by the Emperor Charles, he 
ordered Henry and Catherine both to appear before him at Rome. 

367. The Fall of Wolsey ; his Death (1530). — Henry's pa- 
tience was now completely exhausted. Becoming persuaded that 
Wolsey was not exerting himself as he might to secure the divorce, 
he banished him from court. The hatred of Anne Boleyn and of 
others, for Wolsey had many enemies, pursued the fallen minister. 
Finally, he was arrested on the preposterous charge of high treason. 
While on his way to London the unhappy minister, broken in spirit 
and in health, was prostrated by a fatal fever. As he lay dying in 
the arms of the kind monks of Leicester Abbey, he uttered these 
self-censuring words : " Had I served my God as dihgently as I 
have served my king. He would not have given me over in my 
gray hairs." 

Wolsey had indeed sunk his priestly office in that of the states- 
man, and as a statesman he had often stifled the scruples of con- 
science in obedience to the king's unholy wishes and commands. 

368. The Opinion of the Universities. — Just before Wolsey's 
disgrace a young priest of Cambridge, named Thomas Cranmer, 
had suggested that the universities in England and upon the 
Continent should be asked to give their opinion on the validity 
of the king's marriage with Catherine. If they all agreed that the 
union was invalid, then the Pope could hardly refuse to grant the 
divorce. The plan pleased Henry, and to the universities, accord- 
ingly, the case was submitted. But the opinions of the learned 
doctors were so conflicting,' and, especially in the case of the Eng- 
lish universities, so manifestly tainted with bribery, that nothing 
save delay resulted from this plan of settlement. 

369. Thomas Cromwell. — A man of great power and mark now 
rises to our notice. After the disgrace of Wolsey an attendant of 
his named Thomas Cromwell rapidly assumed in Henry's regard 
the place from which the cardinal had fallen. For the space of 
ten years this strong but unscrupulous man shaped the policy 



FIRST ACTS IN BREACH WITH ROME 341 

of Henry's government. What he proposed to himself was the 
establishment of a royal despotism upon the ruin of every other 
power in the state. Man of iron will that he was, Cromwell pur- 
sued his aims with such terrible relentlessness that the period 
during which his power was supreme has been called the Eng- 
lish Reign of Terror. The executioner's ax was often wet with 
the blood of those who stood in his way, or who in any manner 
incurred his or the king's displeasure. 

It was to the bold suggestions of this man that Henry now Hs- 
tened. Cromwell's advice to the king was to waste no more time 
in negotiating with the Pope, but at once to renounce the jurisdic- 
tion of the Roman pontiff, proclaim himself supreme head of the 
Church in England, and then get a decree of divorce from his 
own courts. 

370. First Acts in the Breach with Rome (15 33-1 5 34). — 
The advice of Cromwell was acted upon, and by a series of steps 
England was swiftly carried out from under the authority of the 
Roman see. Henry first virtually cut the Gordian knot by a 
secret marriage with Anne Boleyn, notwithstanding a papal decree 
threatening him with excommunication should he dare to do so. 

Parliament, which was entirely subservient to Henry's wishes, 
now passed a law known as the Act in Restraint of Appeals 
(1533), which made it a crime for any Englishman to carry a 
case out of the realm to the court of Rome. This was to prevent 
Catherine from appealing to the Pope from any decision which 
might be rendered in her case by an English tribunal. 

Cranmer, the Cambridge doctor who had advised the king to 
submit the question of the validity of his union with Catherine 
to the universities, and who had further served him by writing a 
book in favor of the divorce, had, in accordance with the new 
programme, been made Archbishop of Canterbury. He now 
formed a court, tried the case, and of course declared the king's 
marriage with Catherine null and void. 

The following year (1534) Henry procured from Parliament the 
passage of the important Act of Annates, which forbade abso- 
lutely the payment to Rome of the first fruits of archbishoprics 



342 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

and bishoprics, and ordered that these should henceforth be paid 
to the English crown. 

371. The Act of Supremacy (1534). — At Rome the acts of 
Henry and his Parliament were denounced as acts of impious 
usurpation. The Pope issued a bull excommunicating Henry and 
relieving his subjects from their allegiance. 

Henry now took the final and decisive step. He got from Par- 
liament the celebrated Act of Supremacy (1534). This statute 
made Henry '' the only Supreme Head in earth of the Church 
of England," vesting in him absolute control of its offices and 
affairs and turning into his hands the revenue which had hitherto 
flowed into Rome's treasury. A denial of the title given the king 
by the statute was made high treason. 

Such a break with the past met of course with much disapproval, 
and many persons were put to death under the statute. The most 
illustrious victims of this tyranny were John Fisher, Bishop of 
Rochester, and Sir Thomas More, who for several years was one 
of Henry's chief councilors. Both were sent to the block (in 
1535) because they refused to admit the validity of Henry's 
divorce from Catherine and to acknowledge the royal supremacy 
in religious matters. The execution of Thomas More particularly 
created widespread condemnation and dismay. When the Emperor 
Charles V heard what Henry had done, he is reported to have said 
that he would rather have lost the best city in his empire than 
such a councilor ; and Erasmus wrote to a friend, " What a man 
has England and what a friend have I lost ! " 

372. The Suppression of the Monasteries (1536-1539). — The 
suppression of the monasteries was one of Henry's early acts as 
the supreme head of the Church of England. He resolved upon' 
the destruction of the religious houses because, in the first place, 
he coveted their wealth, which at this time included probably one 
fifth of the lands of the realm. Further, the monastic orders were 
openly or secretly opposed to Henry's claims of supremacy in 
religious matters ; and this naturally caused him to regard them 
with jealousy and disfavor. This was another reason with him 
for compassing their ruin. 



SUPPRESSION OF THE MONASTERIES 343 

In order to make the act appear as reasonable as possible, it 
was planned to make the charge of immorality its ostensible 
ground. Accordingly two royal commissioners were appointed 
to inspect the monasteries and make a report upon what they 
might see and learn. If we may beheve the report, the smaller 
houses were conducted in a most shameful manner. The larger 
houses, however, were fairly free from faults. Many of them served 
as schools, hospitals, and inns, and all distributed alms to the 
poor who knocked at their gates. 

But the undoubted usefulness and irreproachable character of 
these larger foundations did not avail to avert ruin from them 
also. During the years 1537 to 1539 all were dissolved, their pos- 
sessors generally surrendering the property voluntarily into the 
hands of the king lest a worse thing than the loss of their houses 
should come upon them. By an act of Parliament in 1539 all 
monastic property was given to the crown. 

Altogether there were six hundred and forty-five monasteries 
broken up. The monastic buildings were generally dismantled, 
every scrap of iron or lead being torn from them, and their unpro- 
tected walls left to sink into picturesque ivy-clad ruins. Small 
pensions were granted to the dispossessed monks, which relieved 
in a measure the suffering and hardship caused by the proceeding. 

The destruction of the monasteries was a signal for the desecra- 
tion and pillage of the sacred relics, images, and shrines with 
which the land was crowded. The destruction of the famous 
pilgrim shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury (sec. 208) is a 
typical case. The saint, because he had upheld the supremacy 
of the Pope against King Henry II, was solemnly tried for 
treason and declared a traitor. His bones were then dragged 
from their receptacle and burned, and the rich adornments and 
offerings of the shrine — great cart loads of jewels and other 
costly things, probably the real secret of Henry's wrath against 
the saint — were confiscated to the royal use (1538). 

A portion of the vast wealth which came into Henry's hands 
through all these confiscations was used in founding schools and 
colleges and in establishing new bishoprics, and a part was devoted 



344 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

to other public purposes ; but by far the greater portion of the 
landed property was sold at merely nominal prices or given out- 
right to the favorites of the king. Many of the leading English 
families of to-day trace the titles of their estates from these confis- 
cated lands of the religious houses. Thus a new aristocracy was 
raised up whose interests led them to oppose any return to Rome ; 
for in such an event their estates were liable, of course, to be 
restored to the monasteries. 

373. Effects upon Parliament of the Suppression of the Monas- 
teries. — The effects of the dissolution of the monasteries upon 
the Upper House of Parliament were, for the time being, most 
disastrous to the cause of English constitutional liberty. The 
House of Lords had hitherto often been a check upon the royal 
power. By the destruction of the religious houses that branch of 
Parliament, already greatly rediiced in strength by the decay of the 
temporal peerage, was still further weakened through the casting 
out of the abbots and priors who held seats in that chamber.* 
At the same time the spiritual lords who were left, that is the 
two archbishops and the bishops, became mere dependents of the 
king, whom the Act of Supremacy had made head of the English 
Church without any superior on earth. 

Thus did the House of Lords almost cease to be a body with a 
mind and will of its own. Since the House of Commons contained 
many servile nominees of the king, the English government now 
became something like an absolute monarchy. 

374. Act to secure Uniformity of Belief (1539). — In the same 
year that Parliament gave into Henry's hands the last of the prop- 
erty of the monastic orders, it passed a bill drawn in conformity 
with his views and called an Act for abolishing Diversity of 
Opinions. By this statute the teachings of the old Church respect- 
ing the real presence in the Eucharist, the celibacy of the priest- 
hood, private Masses, confession to a priest, and other tenets were 
approved as agreeable to the laws of God, and it was made a 
crime for any person to hold, to teach, or to practice opinions 
opposed to any of these dogmas. 

4 Twenty-six abbots and two priors were expelled. 




-V C^ 



V} u ^ 



HENRY'S WIVES 345 

What the Church of England should be called under Henry it 
would be hard to say. It was not Protestant ; and it was just as 
far from being truly Catholic. That it was distinctively neither the 
one nor the other is shown by the character of the persecutions 
that took place. Catholics and Protestants alike were harassed 
and put to death. Thus on one occasion three CathoHcs who 
denied that the king was the rightful head of the Church and three 
Protestants who disputed the doctrine of the real presence in the 
Eucharist were dragged on the same sled to the place of execution. 

375. Henry's Wives Henry's troubles with his wives form 

a curious and shameful page in the history of England's kings. 
Anne Boleyn retained the affections of her royal husband only a 
few months. She was charged with unfaithfulness and beheaded, 
leaving a daughter, who became the famous Queen Elizabeth. The 
day after the execution of Anne the king married Jane Seymour, 
who died the following year. She left a son by the name of Edward. 

The fourth marriage of the king was to Anne of Cleves, who 
enjoyed her queenly honors only a few months.^ Th^ king becom- 
ing enamored of a young lady named Catherine Howard, Anne 
was divorced on the charge of a previous betrothal, and a new 
alliance formed. But Catherine was proved guilty of misconduct 
before her marriage, and her head fell upon the block. The sixth 
and last wife of this amatory monarch was Catherine Parr. She 
was a discreet woman, and managed to outlive her husband. 

376. Henry's Death and Character ; his Work Henry died 

in 1547. Very diverse views have been held of his character. 
He was admittedly meddlesome, cruel, arbitrary, and selfish. 

5 Thomas Cromwell had arranged this marriage; because it had proved so unsatis- 
factory to Henry, he withdrew his favor from him, and very soon, on the charge of 
his having taken bribes and of other misconduct, sent him to the block (1540). In 
this, as in similar cases, the king acted under the forms of law. He secured from the 
subservient Parliament a bill of attainder, which is an act passed like an ordinary 
statute. Before Cromwell's time, the accused had a right to be heard in his own 
defense. But Cromwell, to please his master, had brought it about that Parliament 
could venture to condemn a person without a hearing. It was poetic justice that 
made Cromwell himself a victim of this instrument of tyranny. Because of the mis- 
use by the English Parliament of this power, the framers of the Constitution of the 
United States, in enumerating the powers of Congress, inserted this clause : " No bill 
of attainder . , . shall be passed." 



346 



THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 



Even if the English people are indebted to him for their national 
independent Church, still they owe him for this no gratitude; 
for what he did here proceeded primarily from the most ignoble 
impulses and motives, and not from regard for the spiritual wel- 
fare of his subjects or from sympathy with religious reform. 

In another sphere, however, Henry accomplished a work which 
entitles him to the grateful remembrance of a people who pride 
themselves on their mastery of the sea. He had the vision to dis- 
cern that England's dominion must be sought not on the Euro- 
pean Continent but on the ocean. Hence he took a deep interest 
in naval affairs. At a time when the continental sovereigns were 
creating standing armies, he, as it has been put, created for England 
a " standing navy." He brought to perfection the sailing war ship, 

and gave it precedence over the 
oared vessel, which up to this time 
had held the chief place in the 
world's war navies. Thus under 
Henry the English navy, in the 
words of an eminent naval author- 
ity, "was becoming an entirely 
new thing, a thing the world had 
never seen before." The change 
was somewhat like that effected 
when the steamship replaced the 
sailing vessel. 

377. Literature under Henry 
VIII; Morels Utopia, — The most 
prominent literary figure of this 
period is Sir Thomas More. The 
work upon which his fame as a writer mainly rests is his Utopia, 
or ''Nowhere," a romance like Plato's Republic or Sir Philip 
Sidney's Arcadia. It pictures an imaginary kingdom away on an 
island in the New World, then just discovered, where the laws, 
manners, and customs of the people were represented as being 
ideally perfect. It was the wretchedness of the lower classes, the 
religious intolerance, the despotic government of the times which 




Fig. 63. — Sir Thomas More 
(After the painting by Holbein) 



SIR THOMAS MORE'S "UTOPIA 



347 



inspired the Utopia. The great mass of the people were living in mis- 
erable mud hovels, like those of the Irish tenants of to-day. Society 
was simply " a conspiracy of the rich against the poor." The gov- 
ernment of Henry and his ministers resembled an Oriental tyranny. 

It was this state of things that forced from the sensitive soul of 
More this complaint. " No such cry of pity for the poor," says 
Green, " had been heard since the days of Piers Plowman." 
But More's was not simply such a cry of despair as was that of 
Langland. He saw a better future ; and with a view of reforming 
them, pointed out the existing ills of society. He did this by 
telling how things were in "Nowhere," — how the houses and 
grounds were all inviting, the streets broad and clean ; how every- 
body was taught to read and write, and no one obliged to work 
more than six hours a day; how drinking houses, brawls, and 
wars were unknown ; how the criminal classes were treated with 
the view of effecting their reformation ; how in this happy republic 
every person had a part in the government, and was allowed to 
follow what religion he chose. 

In this wise way More suggested improvements in social, polit- 
ical, and religious matters. He did not expect, however, that 
Henry would follow all his suggestions, — indeed. More himself, 
before his death, materially changed his views regarding religious 
toleration, — for he closes his account of the Utopians with this 
admission : " I confess that many things in the commonwealth of 
Utopia I rather wish than hope to see adopted in our own." 

IV. Changes in Creed and Ritual under 
Edward VI (1547-15 5 3) 

378. Events at the Accession In accordance with the pro- 
visions of a Succession Act passed in Henry's reign, his only son, 
Edward, by Jane Seymour, succeeded him. As Edward was but 
a mere child of nine years, the government was conducted by a 
council of regency, made up both of reformers and Cathohcs ; but 
the reformers usurped authority in the body and conducted the 
government in the interest of their party. 



348 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

The young king was carefully taught the doctrines of the 
reformers, and many changes were made in the creed and serv- 
ice of the English Church, which carried it farther away from 
the Church of Rome. It is these changes in the religion that 
constitute the events most worthy of our attention. 

379. Changes in the Religion. — Under the new regime all 
pictures and images and crosses were cleared from the churches ; 
the frescoes were covered with whitewash, and the stained-glass 
windows were broken in pieces; the robe and the surplice were 
cast away ; the use of tapers, holy water, and incense was discon- 
tinued; the veneration of the Virgin and the keeping of saints' 
days were prohibited ; belief in purgatory was denounced as a vain 
superstition kept up for purposes of gain, and prayers for the dead 
were interdicted ; the real or bodily presence of Christ in the bread 
and wine of the sacram^ent was denied; the prohibition against 
the marriage of the clergy was annulled ; and the services of the 
Church, which hitherto — save as to some portion of them during 
the last three years of Henry's reign — had been conducted in 
Latin, were ordered to be said in the language of the people. 

In order that the provision last mentioned might be effectually 
carried out, the English Book of Common Prayer was prepared 
by Archbishop Cranmer, and the first copy issued in 1549. This 
book, which was in the main simply a translation of the old Latin 
Missal "sjA Breviary^ with the subsequent change of a word here 
and a passage there to keep it in accord with the growing new 
doctrines, is the same that is used in the Anglican Church at the 
present time. 

In 1552 were published the famous Forty-two Articles of Reli- 
gion, which formed a compendious creed of the reformed faith. 
These articles, reduced finally to thirty-nine, form the present 
standard of faith and doctrine in the Church of England. 

380. Persecutions to secure Uniformity. — These sweeping 
changes and innovations in the old creed and in the services of 
the Church would have worked little hardship or wrong had only 
everybody, as in More's happy republic, been left free to favor 
and follow what religion he would. But unfortunately it was only 



ACCESSION OF MARY 349 

away in " Nowhere " that men were allowed perfect freedom of 
conscience and worship. The idea of toleration had not yet dawned 
upon the world, save in the happier moments of some such gener- 
ous and wide-horizoned soul as his that conceived the Utopia. 

By royal edict all preachers and teachers were forced to sign 
the Forty- two Articles ; and severe laws, known as Acts for the 
Uniformity of Service, punished with severe penalties any de- 
parture from the forms of the new prayer book. Even the Prin- 
cess Mary, who remained a conscientious adherent of the old 
faith, was harassed and persecuted because she would have the 
Catholic service in her own private chapel. 

Many persons during the reign were imprisoned for refusing to 
conform to the new worship ; while two at least were given to the 
flames as " heretics and contemners of the Book of Common 
Prayer." Probably a large majority of the EngHsh people were at 
this time still good Catholics at heart. 

V. Reaction under Mary (15 5 3-1 5 58) 

381. Accession of Mary; her Marriage to Philip of Spain. — 

Upon the death of Edward an attempt was made, in the interest 
of the Protestant party, to place upon the throne Lady Jane Grey, 
a grandniece of Henry VIII ; but the people, knowing that Mary 
was the rightful heir to the throne, rallied about her, and she was 
proclaimed queen amidst great demonstrations of loyalty. Soon 
after her accession she was married to Philip II of Spain. 

This marriage had been planned by Philip's father, the Emperor 
Charles V, in the hope that thereby England might become actu- 
ally or in effect a part of the Spanish empire. Had the marriage 
worked out in this way and England been secured as an ally of 
the papal party in the great combat between Catholicism and 
Protestantism, the issue of the struggle might have been very 
different from what it was. 

382. Reconciliation with Rome (1554). — The majority of the 
English prelates had never in their hearts approved the recent 
ecclesiastical changes. Their zeal for the ancient Church, allied 



350 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

with Mary's, now quickly brought about the full reestablishment 
of the Catholic worship throughout the realm. Parliament voted 
that the nation should return to its obedience to the papal see ; 
and then the members of both Houses fell upon their knees to 
receive at the hands of the papal legate absolution from the sin of 
heresy and schism. The sincerity of their repentance was attested 
by their repeal of all the acts by which the new worship had 
been set up in the land. The joy at Rome was unbounded. The 
prodigal had returned to his father's house. 

But not quite everything done by the reformers was undone. 
Parliament refused to restore the confiscated Church lands, which 
was very natural, as much of this property was now in the hands 
of the lords and commoners. Mary, however, in her zeal for 
the ancient faith, restored a great part of the property still in 
the possession of the crown, and refounded many of the ruined 
monasteries and abbeys. 

383. The Martyrs: Latimer and Ridley (1555), and Cranmer 
(1556). — With the reestablishment of the Catholic worship, the 
Protestants in their turn were subjected to persecution. Alto- 
gether, between two and three hundred persons suffered death 
during this reign on account of their religion. The three most 
eminent martyrs were Latimer, Ridley, and Cranmer. Latimer 
and Ridley were burned at the same stake. As the torch was 
applied to the fagots, the aged Latimer — he was seventy years 
old — encouraged his companion with these memorable words : 
" Be of good comfort. Master Ridley, and play the man ; we shall 
this day, by God's grace, light such a candle in England as I 
trust shall never be put out." 

Mary should not be judged harshly for the part she took in the 
persecutions that disfigured her reign. It was not her fault, but 
the fault of the age, that these things were done. Punishment of 
heresy was then regarded, by almost all Catholics and Protestants 
alike, as a duty which could be neglected by those in authority 
only at the peril of Heaven's displeasure. 

384. The Loss of Calais (1558). — The marriage of Philip and 
Mary had been earnestly wished for by the Emperor Charles V, 



ELIZABETH 35 1 

in order that Philip, in those wars with France which he well 
knew must be a part of the legacy he should transmit to his son, 
might have the powerful aid of England. This was Phihp's chief 
reason for seeking the alliance, and in due time he called upon 
Mary for assistance in a war against the French king. The Eng- 
hsh people were very reluctant to take any part in the quarrel; 
but Mary's council at last yielded to her urgent sohcitations, and 
aid was extended to Philip. The result was the mortifying loss to 
England of Calais, which the French, by an unexpected attack, 
snatched out of the hands of its garrison (1558). 

VI. Final Establishment of Protestantism under 
Elizabeth (15 58-1603) 

385. The Queen. — Elizabeth, who was twenty-five years of age 
when the death of Mary called her to the throne, was the daughter 
of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. She seems to have inherited 
the characteristics of both parents ; hence perhaps the inconsist- 
encies of her disposition. She possessed a masculine intellect, a 
strong will, admirable judgment, and great political tact. It was 
these qualities which rendered her reign the strongest and most 
illustrious in the record of England's sovereigns, and raised the 
nation from a position of comparative insignificance to a foremost 
place among the states of Europe. 

Along with her good and queenly qualities and accomplish- 
ments, Elizabeth had many unamiable traits and unwomanly ways. 
She was capricious, treacherous, unscrupulous, and ungrateful. 
Deception and falsehood were her usual weapons in diplomacy. 
" In the profusion and recklessness of her lies," declares Green, 
" Elizabeth stood without a peer in Christendom." 

Yet, notwithstanding all the faults of this remarkable woman, 
she was always popular with her subjects, and this largely for the 
same reason that Philip II was popular in Spain, — because she 
was in perfect sympathy with her people and represented their 
ideals and aspirations. Her subjects' strong liking is embalmed in 
the familiar title they bestowed upon her, — " Good Queen Bess." 



352 



THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 



Elizabeth never married, notwithstanding Parliament was con- 
stantly urging her to do so, and suitors, among whom was 
Philip II of Spain, were as numerous as those who sought the 
hand of Penelope. She declared — very late in her reign, however 

— that on her coro- 
nation day she was 
married to the Eng- 
lish realm, and that 
she would have no 
other husband. She 
remained to the end 
the "fair Vestal 
throned by the 
West." 

386. Her Minis- 
ters. — One secret 
of the strength and 
popularity of Eliza- 
beth's government 
^vas the admirable 
judgment she exer- 
cised in her choice 
of advisers. The 
courtiers with whom 
she crowded her. 
receptions might be 
frivolous persons; but 
F1G64. — Queen Elizabeth. (The Ermine about her council 
Portrait, from the collection of the Marquis ^^^^^ ^^^ gathered 

of Salisbury, Hatfield House) . , .4.^^„„ 

^ thewisest ana Strong- 

est men of the realm. And yet Elizabeth's government was 
really her own. We now know that her advisers did not have as 
much to do with shaping the policies of the reign as was formerly 
believed. 

The most eminent of the queen's ministers was Sir William 
Cecil (Lord Burghley), a man of great sagacity and ceaseless 




REESTABLISHMENT OF REFORMED CHURCH 353 

industry, and a vigilant and prudent administrator. He stood at 
the head of the queen's council for forty years. His son Robert, 
Sir Nicholas Bacon, and Sir Francis Walsingham were also promi- 
nent among the queen's advisers. 

387. Reestablishment of the Reformed Church. — As Mary 
undid the work in religion of Henry and Edward, so now her 
work was undone by Elizabeth. Elizabeth favored the reformed 
faith rather from policy than from conviction. It was to the 
Protestants alone that she could look for support ; her title to the 
crown was denied by every true Catholic in the realm, for she was 
the child of that marriage which the Pope had forbidden under 
pain of the penalties of the Church. But what doubtless con- 
tributed most to fix her in the determination to follow Henry's 
policy as regards the Papacy was her desire to possess supreme 
authority in ecclesiastical as well as in civil matters. 

The religious houses which had been refounded by Mary were 
again dissolved, and Parliament by the two important Acts of 
Supremacy and Uniformity (1559) reestablished the independ- 
ence of the Church in England. The Act of Supremacy required 
all the clergy, and every person holding office under the crown, 
to take an oath declaring the queen to be the supreme governor 
of the realm in all spiritual as well as in all temporal things, and 
renouncing the authority or jurisdiction of any foreign prince or 
prelate. For refusing to deny the supremacy of the Pope many 
Catholics during EHzabeth's reign suffered death, and many more 
endured within the Tower the worse horrors of the rack. 

The Act of Uniformity forbade any clergyman to use any but 
the Anglican liturgy, and required every person to attend the 
EstabHshed Church on Sunday and other holy days. The perse- 
cutions which arose under this law caused many Catholics to seek 
freedom of worship in other countries. 

388. The Protestant Nonconformists ; Puritans and Separatists. 
— The Catholics were not the only persons among Elizabeth's 
subjects who were opposed to the Anglican worship. There were 
Protestant nonconformists — the Puritans and Separatists — who 
troubled her almost as much as the Catholics. 



354 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

The Puritans were so named because they desired 2i purer form 
of worship than the Anglican. The term was appUed to them in 
derision; but the sterHng character of those thus designated at 
length turned the epithet of reproach into a badge of honorable 
distinction. They did not withdraw from the Estabhshed Church, 
but remaining within its pale labored to reform it and to shape 
its discipline to their notions. These Puritans were destined to 
play a prominent part in the later affairs of England. Under the 
Stuarts, as we shall see, they became strong enough to overturn 
State and Church, and remold both to suit their own ideas. 

The Separatists were still more zealous reformers than the Puri- 
tans. In their hatred of everything that bore any resemblance to 
the Catholic worship, they flung away the surplice and the prayer 
book, severed all connection with the Established Church, and 
refused to have anything to do with it. Under the Act of Uniform- 
ity they were persecuted with great severity, so that multitudes were 
led to seek an asylum upon the Continent. It was from among 
these exiles gathered in Holland that a little later came the pas- 
sengers of the Mayflower and Speedwell^ — the Pilgrim Fathers, 
who laid the foundations of civil liberty in the New World. 

389. Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots. — A large part of the his- 
tory of Elizabeth's reign is intertwined with the story of her 
cousin, Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, the "modern Helen," 
*' the most beautiful, the weakest, the most attractive, and most 
attracted of women." She was the daughter of James V of Scot- 
land, and to her i7i right of birth — according to all Catholics, 
who denied the validity of Henry's marriage with Anne Boleyn 
— belonged the English crown next after Mary Tudor. 

Upon the death, in 1560, of her husband, Francis II of France, 
Mary gave up life at the French court and returned to her native 
land. She was now in her nineteenth year. The subtle charm of 
her beauty seems to have bewitched all who came into her pres- 
ence, save the more zealous of the reformers, who could never 
forget that their young sovereign was a Catholic. The stern old 
John Knox made her life miserable. He called her a " Moabite," 
and other opprobrious names, till she wept from sheer vexation. 



MARY STUART, QUEEN OF SCOTS 



355 



She dared not punish the impudent preacher, for she knew too 
well the strength of the Protestant feeling among her subjects. 

Other things now conspired with Mary's hated religion to 
alienate entirely the love of her people. Her second husband, 
Lord Darnley, was murdered. The queen was suspected of hav- 
ing some guilty knowledge of the affair. She was imprisoned 
and forced to abdicate in favor of her infant son James. 

Escaping from prison, Mary fled into England (1568). Here 
she threw herself upon the generosity of her cousin Elizabeth, 





Fig. 65. — Mary Queen of Scots. 
(After a modem popular painting. 

. A comparison with the accom- 
panying authentic portrait (Fig. 66) 
will show in what degree the sub- 
ject has been idealized) 



Fig, 66. — Mary Stuart as Queen 
OF France:^ (After a contempo- 
rary and authentic portrait in the 
Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; 
from Gust's Notes on the Authentic 
Portraits of Mary Queen of Scots) 



and entreated aid in recovering her throne. But the part which 
she was generally beHeved to have had in the murder of her 
husband, her disturbing claims to the English throne, and the 
fact that she was a Catholic all conspired to determine her fate. 
She was placed in confinement, and for nineteen years remained 
a prisoner. During all this time Mary was the center of 

6 The striking resemblance of this portrait of Mary to that of her cousin Elizabeth 
(Fig. 64) will be noticed. 



356 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

innumerable plots on the part of the Catholics, which aimed at 
setting her upon the English throne. The Pope, Pius V, aided 
these conspirators by a bull excommunicating Elizabeth and releas- 
ing her subjects from their allegiance (15 70), Finally, a carefully 
laid conspiracy to assassinate Elizabeth and place Mary on the 
throne was unearthed. The Spanish king, Philip II, was implicated. 
He wrote, "The affair is so much in God's service that it certainly 
deserves to be supported, and we must hope that our Lord will 
prosper it, unless our sins be an impediment thereto." 

Mary was tried for complicity in the plot, was declared guilty, 
and, after some hesitation, feigned or otherwise, on the part of 
Elizabeth, was ordered to the block (1587). Even after Eliza- 
beth had signed the warrant for her execution she attempted to 
evade responsibility in the matter by causing a suggestion to be' 
made to Mary's jailers that they should kill her secretly. 

390. The "Invincible Armada"; "Britain's Salamis" (15 88). — 
The execution of Mary Stuart led immediately to the memorable 
attempt against England by the Spanish Armada. Before her 
death the Queen of Scots had by will disinherited her son and 
bequeathed to Philip II of Spain her claims to the English crown. 
To enforce these rights, to avenge the death of Mary, to punish 
EHzabeth for rendering aid to his rebellious subjects in the Neth- 
erlands, and to deal a fatal blow to the Reformation in Europe 
by crushing the Protestants of England, Pliihp resolved upon 
making a tremendous effort for the conquest of the heretical 
island. Vast preparations were made for carrying out this project, 
which Philip had long revolved in mind. Great fleets were gath- 
ered in the harbors of Spain, and a large army was assembled in 
the Netherlands to cooperate with the naval armament. 

Pope Sixtus V encouraged Philip in the enterprise, which was 
thus rendered a sort of crusade. At last the fleet, consisting of 
about one hundred and thirty ships, the largest naval armament 
that had ever appeared upon the Atlantic, and boastfully called 
the " Invincible Armada," set sail from Lisbon for the Channel. 
The approaching danger produced a perfect fever of excitement 
in England. Never did Roman citizens rise more splendidly to 



THE "INVINCIBLE ARMADA" 357 

avert some terrible peril threatening the repubHc than the Eng- 
lish people now arose as a single man to defend their island 
realm against the revengeful and ambitious project of Spain. 
The imminent danger served to unite all classes, the gentry 
and the yeomanry, Protestants and Catholics. The latter might 
intrigue to set a Mary Stuart on the English throne, but they 
were not ready to betray their land into the hands of the hated 
Spaniards. " In that memorable year," says Hallam, in a pas- 
sage where his usually cold, judicial phrases flame into eloquence, 
" when the dark cloud gathered around our coasts, when Europe 
stood by in fearful suspense to behold what should be the result 
of that great cast in the game of human politics, what the craft 
of Rome, the power of Philip, the genius of Farnese, could 
achieve against the island queen with her Drakes and Cecils — 
in that agony of the Protestant faith and English name, they 
stood the trial of their spirit without swerving from their alle- 
giance. It was then that the Catholics in every county repaired 
to the standard of the lord lieutenant, imploring that they might 
not be suspected of bartering the national independence for their 
religion itseK." 

On July 19, 1588, the Armada was first descried by the watch- 
men on the English cliffs. It swept up the Channel in the form 
of a gteat crescent, seven miles in width from tip to tip of horn. 
The English ships, about eighty in number, whose light structure 
and swift movements, together with the superior gunnery of their 
sailors, gave them a great advantage over the clumsy Spanish gal- 
leons, almost immediately began to impede their advance, and for 
seven days incessantly harassed the Armada. 

One night, as the damaged fleet lay off the harbor of Calais, 
the English sent fire ships among the vessels, whereby a number 
were destroyed and a panic created among the others. A deter- 
mined attack the next day by Howard, Drake, and Lord Henry 
Seymour inflicted a still severer loss upon the fleet. 

The Spaniards, thinking now of nothing save escape, spread 
their sails in flight, proposing to get away by sailing northward 
around the British Isles. But the storms of the northern seas 



358 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

dashed many of the remaining ships to pieces on the Scottish 
and the Irish shores. Barely one third of the ships of the 
Armada ever reentered the harbors whence they sailed. When 
intelligence of the woeful disaster was carried to the imperturb- 
able Philip, he simply said, ''God's will be done; I sent my 
fleet to fight against the English, not against the elements." 

Well may the great fight in the Channel which shattered the 
Armada be called "Britain's Salamis": for like Athens' Salamis 




Fig. 67. — Spanish and English War Vessels of the Sixteenth 
Century. (From an engraving) 

it revealed the weakness and proclaimed the downfall of a vast 
despotic empire, while at the same time it disclosed the strength 
and announced the rise of a new free state destined to a great 
future. 

But the destruction of the Spanish Armada concerned other 
than purely English and Spanish interests. It marked the turn- 
ing point in the great duel between Catholicism and Protes- 
tantism. It set definite limits to the Catholic reaction. It not 
only decided that England was to remain Protestant, but it fore- 
shadowed the independence of the Protestant Netherlands, and 



MARITIME AND COLONIAL ENTERPRISES 359 

assured, or at least greatly helped to assure, the future of Prot- 
estantism in Scandinavia and in North Germany. 

39 1 . Philip tampers with the Irish ; the Tyrone Rebellion (1594- 
1603). — Having failed in his direct attack upon England, Philip 
now sought to harass Elizabeth by giving aid to her Irish enemies. 

Ireland had never been thoroughly subjugated by the English, 
and the native tribes were in a state of chronic revolt against the 
English intruders. In 1594 an insurrection, headed by the Earl 
of Tyrone (Hugh O'Neill), having broken out in Ulster, Philip 
promised to send the insurgents aid. To prevent his doing so, 
Elizabeth sent a fleet to harass him at home. The EngHsh sailed 
into the port of Cadiz, destroyed every vessel in the harbor, 
sacked the city, and left it a heap of ruins (1596). This destruc- 
tion of her chief seaport was even more humiliating to Spain 
than the destruction of her " Invincible Armada." 

The Irish rebels, because of their dallyings with Philip, were 
now. proceeded against with vigor. The Celtic resistance was 
finally broken, mainly by the removal of the natives from some 
of the best regions of the island and the filling of the places thus 
made empty with Scottish and EngHsh settlers (sec. 461). 

392. Maritime and Colonial Enterprises. — The crippling of the 
naval power of Spain left England mistress of the seas. The little 
island realm now entered upon the most splendid period of her 
history. These truly were " the spacious times of great Elizabeth." 
The EngHsh people, stirred by recent events, seemed to burn with 
a feverish impatience for maritime adventure and glory. Many 
a story of the daring exploits of EngHsh sea rovers during the reign 
of Elizabeth seems like a repetition of some tale of the old Vikings. 

Among all these sea rovers, half explorer, half adventurer, Sir 
Francis Drake (about 1540-15 96) was preeminent. Before the 
Armada days he had sailed round the globe (15 7 7-1 5 80), bring- 
ing home with him an immense booty which he had got as ransom 
from the cities of Peru and Chile, and for the achievement had 
been knighted by Queen EHzabeth. 

Especially deserving of mention among the enterprises of these 
stirring and romantic times are the undertakings and adventures 



36o THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 

of Sir Walter Raleigh (1552 ?-i6i8). Several expeditions were 
sent out by him for the purpose of making explorations and form- 
ing settlements in the New World. One of these, which explored 
the central coasts of North America, returned with such glowing 
accounts of the beauty and richness of the land visited, that, in 
honor of the virgin queen, it was named Virginia. 

Raleigh attempted to establish colonies in the new land (1585- 
1590), but the settlements were unsuccessful. The settlers, how- 
ever, when they returned home, carried back with them the 
tobacco plant, and introduced into England the habit of smok- 
ing it."^ It was at this time also that the potato, a native product 
of the New World, was brought to Ireland. These together with 
maize, or Indian corn, were the chief return the New World 
made to the Old for the great number of domesticated plants 
and grains which it received from thence. 

393. The Queen's Death. — The closing days of Elizabeth's 
reign were to her personally dark and gloomy. She seemed to 
be burdened with a secret grief ^ as well as by the growing in- 
firmities of age. She died March 24, 1603, in the seventieth year 
of her age and the forty-fifth of her reign. With her ended the 
Tudor line of English sovereigns. 

Literature of the Elizabethan Era 

394. Influences Favorable to Literature. — The years covered 
by the reign of Elizabeth constitute one of the most momentous 
periods in history. It was the age when Europe was most deeply 
stirred by the Reformation. It was, too, a period of marvelous 
phy-sical and intellectual expansion and growth. The discoveries of 

. Columbus and others had created a New World. The Renaissance 
had re-created the Old World, — had revealed an unsuspected 
treasure in the civilizations of the past. Thus everything conspired 
to quicken men's intellect and stimulate their imagination. 

"^ Some years before this the plant had been carried to Spain and to France, but 
seems to have been valued mainly for its medicinal qualities. 

8 In 1 601 she sent to the block her chief favorite, the Earl of Essex, who had been 
found guilty of treason. 



LITERATURE OF ELIZABETHAN ERA 36 1 

An age of such activity and achievement almost of necessity 
gives birth to a strong and vigorous Hterature. And thus is 
explained, in part at least, how during this period the English 
people — for no people of Europe felt more deeply the stir and 
movement of the times, nor helped more to create this same stir 
and movement, than the English nation — should have developed 
a literature of such originality and richness and strength as to 
make it the prized inheritance of all the world. "The great 
writers who shine in the literary splendor of the Elizabethan 
Age," says an eminent critic, "were the natural product of the 
newly awakened, thoughtful English nation of that day." 

395. The Writers. — To make special mention of all the great 
writers who adorned the Ehzabethan era would carry us quite 
beyond the limits of our book. Having said something of the 
influence under which they wrote, we will simply add that this 
age was the age of Shakespeare and Spenser and Bacon.® 

Selections from the Sources. — More's Utopia is the choicest literary- 
product of the early "revival of learning in England. The student should 
not fail to read it carefully. It lights up at once the social, the political, 
and the religious world of the time (cf. sec. 377). For a. great variety of 
illustrative material, turn to Adams and Stephens, Select Documents of 
English Constitutional History, pp. 213-326; Henderson, Side Lights on 
English History, pp. 1-32 ; and Kendall, Source-Book, chaps, viii, ix, and x. 
In Payne, Voyages of the Elizabethan Seamen (First Series, Oxford, 1893), 
read " The Famous Voyage of Sir Francis Drake into the South Sea," 
pp. 196-229. 

Secondary Works. — The Cambridge Modern History, vol. i, chap. xiv. 
Green, Short History of the English People, chaps, vi and vii. Froude, 
English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century and The Spanish Story of the 
Armada. Gasquet, Henry VIII and the English Monasteries and The 
Eve of the Reformation. These are the works of an eminent Catholic 
scholar. Pollard, Henry VIII. Creighton, Queen Elizabeth. Bourne, 
Sir Philip Sidney. In the Twelve English Statesmen series, Creighton, 
Cardinal Wolsey, and Beesly, Queen Elizabeth. For constitutional matters, 
turn to Hallam's, Taswell-Langmead's, and Macy's constitutional his- 
tories. For concise narrations of the events dealt with in this chapter, see 
Gardiner's, Montgomery's,Terry's, Coman and Kendall's, Andrews', 

9 William Shakespeare (1564-1616); Edmund Spenser (1552 ?-i599); Francis Bacon 
(1561-1626). Shakespeare and Bacon, it will be noticed, outlived Elizabeth. 



362 



THE ENGLISH REFORMATION 



and Cheyney's text-books on English history. And for biographical in- 
formation, turn to the excellent articles in the English Dictionary of National 
Biography. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Voyages of John and Sebastian Cabot. 
2. Sir Thomas More and his Utopia. 3. The story of Lady Jane Grey. 
4. Sir Walter Raleigh's exploring and colonizing enterprises in the new 
lands. 5. The introduction from the New World into Europe of the 
potato, maize, and the tobacco plant. 6. The Earl of Essex and Queeu 
Elizabeth. 



1^- 








Fig. 68. — Melrose Abbey. (From a photograph) 

As the ruins of Fountains Abbey (see Plate VI) are a memorial of the iconoclasm 
of the Reformation movement in England, so are the remains of Melrose 
Abbey a like monument of the iconoclastic phase of the Reformation in 
Scotland. With the change in doctrines there, the monks of the historic abbey 
— it was founded in the thirteenth century — were driven out and the 
beautiful sculptures of the abbey church defaced 




Fig. 69. — Typical Dutch Scene: Zaandam. (From a photograph) 



CHAPTER XXIII 



THE> REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS: RISE OF THE DUTCH 
REPUBLIC (1572-1609) 

396. The Country. — The name Netherlands (lowlands) was 
formerly appHed to all that district in the northwest of Europe, 
much of it sunk below the level of the sea, now occupied by the 
kingdoms of the Netherlands and Belgium. A large part of this 
region is simply the delta accumulations of the Rhine and other 
rivers emptying into the North Sea. Originally it was often over- 
flowed by its streams and inundated by the ocean. 

But this unpromising morass, protected at last by heavy dikes 
seaward against the invasions of the ocean, and by great embank- 
ments inland against the overflow of its streams, was destined to 
become the site of the most potent cities of Europe, and the seat 
of one of the foremost commonwealths of modern times. 

397. The People : Celt and German. — Much Hght is thrown 
upon the history of the Netherlands by keeping in mind the dif- 
ference in race between the original population of the northern 
and that of the southern provinces of the country. 

When the Romans first came in contact with the inhabitants 
of this region, the southern portion of the land was held by 
Celtic tribes, known as the Belgse, while the northern part was 
the home of German clans, chief among which were the Frisians 
and Batavians. These races, kept apart by differences in language 

3^3 



364 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

and temperament, unfortunately were never fused into a single 
people ; and when finally, in the sixteenth century, there came a 
crisis in the life of the European nations, and they were each called 
upon to choose between the Old Church and the New, the northern 
and the southern Netherlanders made different choices, and went 
divergent ways. In the contrasted histories of the predominantly 
Galhc South and the predominantly German North, — the former 
represented to-day by the Catholic kingdom of Belgium, and the 
latter by the Protestant kingdom of the Netherlands, — some his- 
torians find support for the theory that race is a potent influence 
in shaping the destinies of a people. 

398. State of the Country at the Opening of the Modern Age. — 
No country in Europe made greater progress in civihzation during 
the mediaeval era than the Netherlands. At the opening of the 
sixteenth century they contained a crowded and busy population 
of three million souls. The ancient marshes had been transformed 
into carefully kept gardens and orchards. The walled cities num- 
bered between two and three hundred, while thriving villages and 
hamlets were counted by the thousand. 

The great cities that dotted the country depended chiefly for 
their wealth and power upon their manufactures and commerce, 
the carrying trade of Northern Europe being largely in the hands 
of the bold and skilKul Netherland sailors. These cities had 
usurped the place once held by the Hansa towns of Germany. 
Antwerp, situated on the Scheldt, rivaled even the greatest of the 
Italian cities. " I was sad when I saw Antwerp," writes a Venetian 
ambassador, " for I saw Venice surpassed." 

399. The Low Countries under Charles V (1515-1555). — The 
Netherlands, it will be recalled, were part of those possessions 
over which the Emperor Charles V ruled by hereditary right. 
We have seen how towards the close of his reign he set up here 
the Inquisition with the object of suppressing the heresy of the 
reformers (sec. 348). Many persons perished at the stake and 
upon the scaffold, or were strangled, or buried alive.-^ But when 
Charles retired to the monastery at Yuste, the reformed doctrines 

1 Charles' persecutions covered the years from 1521 to 1555. The number of 
martyrs during these years has been greatly exaggerated ; it was put as high as one 



ACCESSION OF PHILIP II 365 

were, notwithstanding all his efforts, far more widely spread and 
deeply rooted in the Netherlands than when he entered upon their 
extirpation by fire and sword. 

400. Accession of Philip II. — In 1555, in the presence of an 
august and princely assembly at Brussels, and amidst the most 
imposing and dramatic ceremonies, Charles V abdicated the crown 
whose _weight he could no longer bear, and placed it upon the 
head of his son Philip. What sort of man this son was, we have 
already learned (sec. 350). 

Philip remained in the Netherlands after his coronation four 
years, employing much of his time in devising means to root out 
the heresy of Protestantism. In 1559 he set sail for Spain, never 
to return. His arrival in the peninsula was celebrated by an auto 
defe at Valladolid, festivities which ended in the burning of thir- 
teen persons whom the Inquisition had condemned as heretics. 

It was not delight at the sight of suffering that led Philip on 
his home-coming to be a spectator at these awful solemnities. He 
doubtless wished through his presence to give sanction to the 
work of the Holy Office, and to impress all with the fact that 
unity of religion in Spain, as the necessary basis of peace and 
unity in the state, was going to be maintained by him at any and 
every cost. 

401. " Long live the Beggars ! " — Upon his departure from the 
Netherlands, Philip intrusted the government to his half-sister 
Margaret, Duchess of Parma, as regent. 

Under the administration of Margaret (1559-15 67) the persecu- 
tion of the Protestants went on with renewed bitterness. At last 
the nobles leagued together and resolved to petition the regent for 
a redress of grievances. When the duchess learned that the peti- 
tioners were about to wait upon her, she displayed great agitation. 
Thereupon one of her councilors exclaimed, "What, madam! 
afraid of these beggars? " 

The expression was carried to the nobles, who were assembled at 
a banquet. Straightway one of their number suspended a beggar's 

hundred thousand by the celebrated Dutch jurist, Grotius (d. 1645). Blok believes 
the number actually suffering the death penalty was less than one thousand. See his 
History of the People of the Netherlands, vol. ii, p. 317. 



366 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

wallet from his neck and, filling a wooden bowl with wine, proposed 
the toast, " Long live the beggars ! " The name was tumultuously 
adopted and became the party designation of the patriot Nether- 
landers during their long struggle with the Spanish power. 

402. The Iconoclasts (1566). — The only reply of the govern- 
ment to the petition of the nobles for a mitigation of the severity 
of the edicts concerning heresy was a decree termed the Mod- 
eration, which substituted hanging for burning in the case of 
condemned heretics. 

The pent-up indignation of the people at length burst forth in 
uncontrollable fury. They gathered in great mobs and proceeded 
to demolish every image they could find in the churches through- 
out the country. The monasteries, too, were sacked, their libraries 
burned, and the inmates driven from their cloisters. The tempest 
destroyed innumerable art treasures, which have been as sincerely 
mourned by the lovers of the- beautiful as the burned rolls of the 
Alexandrian library have been lamented by the lovers of learning. 

403. The Duke of Alva and the "Council of Blood" (1567). — 
The year following this outbreak Philip sent to the Netherlands a 
veteran Spanish army, '^one of the most perfect engines of war 
ever seen in any age," headed by the Duke of Alva, a man after 
Philip's own heart, deceitful, fanatical, and merciless. 

Alva was one of the ablest generals of the age, and the intelli- 
gence of his coming threw the provinces into a state of the greatest 
agitation and alarm. Those who could do so hastened to get out 
of the country. William the Silent, Prince of Orange,^ one of the 
leading noblemen of the Lowlands, fled to Germany, where he 
began to gather an army of volunteers for the struggle which he 
now saw to be inevitable. 

Egmont and Hoom, Catholic noblemen ^ of high rank and great 
distinction, were treacherously seized, cast into prison, and soon 

2 He bore also the title of Count of Nassau. Nassau was a little German state, now 
included in Prussia. Orange was a petty principality on the Rhone, near Avignon. 
It came into the hands of the family of Nassau in 1530. 

3 Many Catholics sympathized at first with the Protestants and acted with them, 
because they felt that Philip's acts were in direct violation of the chartered rights 
and privileges of the cities and provinces of the Netherlands. But Egmont and 
Hoom had been guilty of no overt acts, and their fate was undeserved. 



WILLIAM OF ORANGE 



367 



afterwards beheaded. The duchess was relieved of the govern- 
ment, which was committed to the firmer hands of Alva, who, to 
aid him in the management of affairs, organized a most iniquitous 
tribunal, known in history as the " Council of Blood." 

The Inquisition was now reestablished, and a perfect reign of 
terror began. The number of Alva's victims during his short rule 
— he is said to have boasted that he had put to death over eighteen 
thousand — might almost persuade us that he had deliberately 
purposed the extermination of the people of the Netherlands. 

Besides being subjected to this religious persecution, the Nether- 
landers were oppressed by iniquitous taxes, particularly by an impo- 
sition known as " the tenth penny," a tax often per cent on all sales 
of commodities. This was ruinous to business, and drove the thrifty 
burghers almost to desperation. 

404. William of Orange. — The eyes of all patriot, Netherlanders 
were now turned to the Prince of Orange as their only deliverer. 
The prince, though never a zealous Church partisan, was a deeply, 
religious man, and believed 
himself called of Heaven 
to the work of rescuing his 
country from Spanish tyr- 
anny. Up to this time he 
had been -a Cathohc, hav- 
ing been brought up as a 
page in the household of 
the Emperor Charles V. 
He now embraced Protes- 
tantism; but both as a 
Catholic and as a Protes- 
tant he opposed persecu- 
tion on account of religious 
belief. His attitude here is 
worthy of special notice, 
for it set him apart from the great majority of his contemporaries, 
and had a vast influence in shaping the policies and the des- 
tinies of the small yet great commonwealth of which he was to be 
the founder. 




Fig. 70. — William of Orange (The 
S ilent) . (After a painting by Mierevelt, 
Amsterdam) 



368 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

William of Orange, like our own Washington, was a statesman 
rather than a soldier ; yet even as a leader in war he evinced tal- 
ent of a high order. The Spanish armies were commanded suc- 
cessively by the most experienced and distinguished generals of 
Europe ; but the prince coped ably with them all, and in the mas- 
terly service which he rendered his country earned the title of 
"The Founder of Dutch Liberties." 

405. The Isolation of the Provinces. — Never did any people 
make a more heroic defense of their rehgious and ci\dl liberties 
than did the Netherlanders. The struggle lasted for more than a 
generation, — for over forty years. The Netherlanders sustained 
the unequal contest almost single-handed ; for, though they found 
sympathy among the Protestants of Germany, France, and Eng- 
land, they never received material assistance from any of these 
countries excepting England, and it was not until late in the 
struggle that aid came from this source. 

As regards the German Protestants, they were too much divided 
among themselves to render efficient aid, and besides, being 
mostly Lutherans, they had httle zeal for the cause of the Dutch 
Protestants, who were in the main Calvinists; and just at the 
moment when the growing Protestant sentiment in France en- 
couraged the Netherlanders to look confidently for help from 
the Huguenot party there, the Massacre of St. Bartholomew extin- 
guished forever all hope of succor from that quarter. So the little 
revolted provinces were left to carry on practically unaided, as 
best they might, a contest with the most powerful monarch of 
Christendom. 

406. The Capture of Briel (1572); the Beginning of the Sea 
Power of the Dutch. — It was the nature of their country, half 
land, half water, which enabled the Dutch to make such a pro- 
loiiged and finally successful resistance to the power of Spain. The 
Dutch triumphed because the sea helped them. The influence 
that this element was to exert upon the struggle was foreshadowed 
early in the conflict by a celebrated exploit of Dutch seamen. 

The circumstances of this exploit were these. Almost at the 
outset of the war the Prince of Orange had commissioned some 



BEGINNING OF DUTCH SEA POWER 369 

sailors as privateers to prey upon Spanish ships and to harass the 
coast towns which favored the enemy. Soon the sea was swarm- 
ing with these privateers, — Water Beggars, they were called, 
— who, out of reach of restraint, became veritable freebooters, 
and revived the days and emulated the deeds of the Saxon cor- 
sairs who a thousand years before had put out from these same 
or neighboring creeks and lagoons. 

One day a squadron cf twenty or more ships of these bucca- 
neers, expelled from 5^ngHsh harbors, made a descent upon the 
port of Briel (or Brill) in Holland, seized the place, and held it for 
the Prince of Orange. It was a small affair in itself, somewhat 
like the affair at Lexington in the American Revolution, but it 
stirred wonderfully the people of the Lowlands. Straightway 
other places opened their gates to the Water Beggars, and thus 
the rebellion speedily gained a secure basis for regular naval 
operations. It was the real beginning of the great sea power of 
the future Dutch Republic, which for two hundred years was to 
be a potent force in history. 

Having now gained some idea of the causes of the revolt and 
the nature of the struggle, we must hurry on to the issue of the 
matter. In so doing we shall pass unnoticed many sieges and 
battles, negotiations and treaties.* 

407. " The Spanish Fury " ; the Pacification of Ghent (1576). — 
The year 1576 was marked by a revolt of the Spanish soldiers on 
account of their not receiving their pay, the costly war having 
drained Philip's treasury. The mutinous army marched through 
the land, pillaging city after city and paying themselves with the 
spoils. The beautiful city of Antwerp was ruined. The atrocities 
committed by the frenzied soldiers caused the outbreak to be 
called the " Spanish Fury." 

The terrible state of affairs led to an alHance between Holland 
and Zealand and the other fifteen provinces of the Netherlands, 
known in history as the Pacification of Ghent (1576). The resist- 
ance to the Spanish crown had thus far been carried on without 

4 Read in Motley's liise of the Dutch Republic the siege and sack of Haarlem and 
the relief of Leyden. 



370 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

concerted action among the several states, the Prince of Orange 
having hitherto found it impossible to bring the different provinces 
to agree to any plan of general defense. 

408. The Union of Utrecht (1579). — With the Spanish forces 
under the lead first of Don John of Austria, the hero victor of 
Lepanto (sec. 354), and afterwards of Prince Alexander of Parma, 
a commander of most distinguished ability, the war now went on 
with increased vigor, fortune, with many vacillations, inclining to 
the side of the Spaniards. Disaffection arose among the Nether- 
landers, the outcome of which was the separation of the northern 
and southern provinces. The seven Protestant states of the North, 
the chief of which were Holland and Zealand, by the Treaty of 
Utrecht (1579), drew together in a permanent confederation, 
known as the Seven United Provinces of the Netherlands, with 
the Prince of Orange as stadtholder. In this league was laid the 
foundation of the renowned Dutch Republic. 

Fortunate would it have been for the Netherlands could all of 
the states at this time have been brought to act in concert. Under 
the leadership of the Prince of Orange the seventeen provinces 
might have been consolidated into a powerful nation that might 
now be reckoned among the great states of Europe. However, it 
was destined to be otherwise. The ten CathoHc provinces of the 
South, although they continued their contest with Philip a little 
longer, ultimately submitted to Spanish tyranny. Portions of 
these provinces were eventually absorbed by France, while the 
remainder after varied fortunes finally became the present king- 
dom of Belgium. With their history we shall have no further con- 
cern at present, but turn now to follow the fortunes of the rising 
repubhc of the North. 

409. The "Ban" and the "Apology" (1580-1581). — William 
of Orange was, of course, the animating spirit of the confederacy 
formed by the Treaty of Utrecht. In the eyes of Philip and his 
viceroys he appeared the sole obstacle in the way of the pacifica- 
tion of the provinces and their return to civil and ecclesiastical 
obedience. In vain had Philip sent against him the ablest and 
most distinguished commanders of the age ; in vain had he 



DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 371 

endeavored to detach him from the cause of his country by mag- 
nificent bribes of titles, offices, and fortune. 

Philip now resolved to employ public assassination^ for the 
removal of the invincible general and the incorruptible patriot. 
He published a ban against the prince, declaring him an outlaw 
and " the chief disturber of all Christendom and especially of 
these Netherlands," and offering any one who would deliver him 
into his hands " dead or alive " pardon for any crime he might 
have committed, a title of nobility, and twenty-five thousand 
crowns in gold or in lands. 

The prince responded to the infamous edict by a remarkable 
paper entitled "The Apology of the Prince of Orange," the most 
terrible arraignment of tyranny that was ever penned. The 
"Apology" was scattered throughout Europe, and everywhere 
produced a profound impression. 

410. The Declaration of Independence (July 26, 1581). — The 
United Provinces had not yet formally renounced their allegiance 
to the Spanish crown. They now deposed Philip as their sover- 
eign, broke in pieces his seal, and put forth to the world their 
memorable Declaration of Independence, a document as sacred 
to the Dutch as the Declaration of 1776 is to Americans. 

The preamble contains these words : " Whereas God did not 
create the people slaves to their prince, to obey his commands, 
whether right or wrong, but rather the prince for the sake of the 
subjects, to govern them according to equity, to love and support 
them as a father his children or a shepherd his flock, and even at 
the hazard of life to defend and preserve them ; [therefore] when 
he does not behave thus, but, on the contrary, oppresses them, 

5 We use the expression " public assassination " in order to indicate a change in 
Philip's methods. He had all along* tried to get rid of the prince by private or secret 
assassination. Now his edict of outlawry makes the proposed assassination avowedly 
a public or governmental affair. To comprehend this proceeding we must bear in mind 
that in the sixteenth century assassination was not looked upon with that utter abhor- 
rence with which we rightly regard it ; in the language of the historian Lingard, it 
was then "one of the recognized weapons of constitutional power." In the petty 
states of Italy it was a weapon resorted to almost universally, and seemingly without 
any compunctions of conscience, and even in the North many of the rulers at one time 
^nd another had recourse to it. Compare sees. 389, 420, and 431. 



372 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

seeking opportunities to infringe their ancient customs and privi- 
leges, exacting from them slavish compliance, then he is no 
longer a prince, but a tyrant, and the subjects ... may not 
only disallow his authority, but legally proceed to the choice of 
another prince for their defense." 

This language was a wholly new dialect to the ears of Philip 
and of princes like him. They had never heard anything like it 
before uttered in such tones by a whole people. But it was a 
language destined to spread wonderfully and to become very 
common. We shall hear it often enough a little later in the era 
of the Revolution. It will become familiar speech in England, in 
America, in France, — almost every^vhere.^ 

411. Assassination of the Prince of Orange. — " The ban soon 
bore fruit." Upon the loth day of July, 1584, after five previous 
unsuccessful attempts had been made upon his life, the Prince of 
Orange was fatally shot by an assassin named Balthasar Gerard. 
Philip approved the murder as ^' an exploit of supreme value to 
Christendom." The murderer was put to death with hideous tor- 
ture, but his heirs received the promised reward, being endowed 
with certain of the estates of the prince and honored by eleva- 
tion to the rank of the Spanish nobility. 

The character of William the Silent is one of the most admi- 
rable portrayed in all history. His steadfast and unselfish devo- 
tion to the cause of his country deservedly won for him the love 
of all classes. His people fondly called him " Father William." 
"As long as he lived," writes Motley, "he was the guiding star 
of a whole brave nation; and when he died the little children 
cried in the streets." 

412. Progress of the "War ; the Truce of 1609. — Severe as was 
the blow sustained by the Dutch patriots in the death of the 
Prince of Orange, they did not lose heart, but continued the 
struggle with the most admirable courage and steadfastness. 



6 It has been asserted that the Declaration had an influence in shaping the English 
Declaration of Rights in 1689 and the American Declaration of Independence in 1776 ; 
but there is no evidence that in either of these cases the Dutch Declaration was either 
known or consulted, or that it bad the slightest influence. 



PROGRESS OF THE WAR 



373 



Prince Maurice, a mere youth of seventeen years, the second son 
of WilHam, was chosen stadtholder in his place, and he proved 
himself a worthy son of the great chief and patriot. 

The war now went on with unabated fury. France as well as 
England became involved, both fighting against Philip, who was 
now laying claims to the crowns of both countries. To tell of the 




battles on land lost and won, of the naval combats on almost 
every sea beneath the skies, would be a story without end. The 
destruction of the Spanish Armada in 1588 marked the turning 
point of the struggle, yet not the end of it. Philip II died in 1598, 
but the losing fight was carried on by his successor, Philip III. 

Europe finally grew weary of the seemingly interminable strug- 
gle, and the Spanish commanders becoming convinced that it 
was impossible to reduce the Dutch rebels to obedience by force 



374 REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS 

of arms, negotiations were entered into which issued in the cele- 
brated Truce of 1609."^ This truce was in reahty an acknowledg- 
ment by Spain of the independence of the United Provinces of 
the Netherlands, although the Spanish king was so unwilling to 
admit the fact of his inabiHty to reduce the rebel states to sub- 
mission that the treaty was termed simply "a. truce for twelve 
years." ^ Spain did not formally acknowledge their independence 
until forty years afterwards, in the Peace of Westphalia, at the 
end of the Thirty Years' War (1648). 

Thus ended, after a continuance of over forty years, one of the 
most memorable contests of which history tells. The memories 
of these great days, handed down to later generations of Nether- 
landers, formed a rich and ennobling heritage which, we may 
believe, entered as an element of strength into the Dutch char- 
acter ; for " such traditions," as the historian Hausser truly says, 
" keep a nation upright for centuries." 

413. Influence of the Establishment of the Dutch Republic upon 
both the Religious and the Political Revolution. — The success- 
ful issue of the revolt in the Netherlands meant much for the 
cause of the reformers. The Protestant Lowlands formed a sort 
of strategic point in the great fight between Catholicism and 
Protestantism. The loss of this ground might have proved fatal 
to the Protestant cause. Its maintenance by the forces of the 
reformers set limits to the Catholic reaction. 

The establishment of the Dutch Republic had also great signifi- 
cance for the Political Revolution. In the seventeenth century it 
was Holland that was the foremost champion of the cause of 
political freedom against Bourbon despotism. It was a worthy 
descendant of the first Prince William of Orange who, at one of 



T In 1598 peace had been made between Spain and France (sec. 423, n. 5), and then 
in 1604 between Spain and England. One of the most noteworthy events of the later 
period of the war was the long and finally successful siege by the Spaniards of Ostend, 
" The Troy of modern history." 

8 During this truce period (1609-1621) the Dutch Republic was filled with discord 
through the bitter quarrels of religious and political parties within the little state. 
The most eminent of the Dutch statesmen of the period was John of Barneveld 
(i549?-i6i9). See his Life by Motley. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



375 



the most critical moments of English history, when Englishmen 
were struggling doubtfully against Stuart tyranny, came to their 
help and rescued English liberties from the peril in which they 
lay (sec. 497). 

Selections from the Sources. — Old South Leaflets, No. 72, ''The Dutch 
Declaration of Independence " ; No. 69, " The Description of the New 
Netherlands." 

Secondary Works. — Motley, The Rise of the Dutch Republic and 
History of the United Netherlands. These histories by Motley are classi- 
cal, but they lack in judicial spirit. They should be read in connection with 
Blok, History of the People of the Netherlands. YoUNG, History of the 
Netherlands. Harrison, William the Silent. Putnam, William the Silent. 
For New Netherlands, consult Fiske, The Dutch and Quaker Colonies in 
America. See also bibliography for Chapter XXI. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The protective waterworks of the Low 
Countries. 2. The Netherlands under the dukes of Burgundy. 3. The 
Iconoclasts. 4. How William of Orange acquired his title of "The Silent." 
5. The siege and relief of Leyden. 6. The New Netherlands. 




Fig. 71. 



-Coat of Arms of William^ 
Prince of Orange. 



CHAPTER XXIV 
THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE (1562-1629) 

414. The Reformation in France. — Before Luther posted his 
ninety-five theses at Wittenberg there had appeared in the Uni- 
versity of Paris and elsewhere in France men who from the study 
of the Scriptures had come to entertain opinions very Hke those 
of the German reformer. The movement thus begun received a 
fresh impulse from the uprising in Germany under Luther. 

The Reformation in France, as elsewhere, brought dissension, 
persecution, and war. We have already seen how the Valois ^ king 
Francis I waged an exterminating crusade against his heretical 
Waldensian subjects (sec. 345). His son and successor, Henry II, 
also conceived it to be his duty to uproot heresy ; and it was 
his persecution of his Protestant subjects — a persecution largely 
instigated by his infamous mistress, Diane de Poitiers — that 
sowed the seed of those long and woeful religious wars which he 
left as a terrible legacy to his three feeble sons, Francis, Charles, 
and Henry, who followed him in succession upon the throne. 

Notwithstanding the persecutions of Francis I and Henry II, , 
the reformed faith gained ground rapidly in France during their 
reigns, so that by the time of Henry's death the followers of the 
reformed creed numbered probably between one and two millions. 
The new doctrines had found adherents especially among the 
lesser nobility and the burgher class, and had struck deep root 
in the south, — the region of the old Albigensian heresy. 

415. King Francis II, Catherine de* Medici, and the Guises. — 
Francis II began his reign in 1559. Hi^s wife was the young and 

1 The Valois kings (compare sec. 238, n. 13) of the sixteenth century were Louis XII 
(1498-1515), Francis I (1515-1547), Henry II (1547-1559), Francis II (1559-1560), 
Charles IX (1560-1574), Henry III (1574-1589)- Henry IV, the successor of 
Henry III, was the first of the Bourbons. 



THE HUGUENOT LEADERS 377 

fascinating Mary Stuart of Scotland. Francis was a weak-minded 
boy of sixteen years. The power behind the throne was his mother, 
Catherine de' Medici, and the chiefs of the family of the Guises. 

Catherine was an Itahan. She seems to have been almost or 
quite destitute of religious convictions of any kind. She was 
determined to rule, and this she did by holding the balance of 
power between the two rehgious parties. When it suited her pur- 
pose, she favored the Protestants ; and when it suited her purpose 
better, she favored the Catholics. Through her counsels and pol- 
icies she contributed largely to make France wretched through the 
reigns of her three sons, and to bring her house to a miserable end. 

At the head of the family of the Guises stood Francis, Duke of 
Guise, and his brother Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine. Both of these 
men were zealous Catholics. Mary Stuart, the young queen, was 
their niece, and through her they ruled the boy king. 

416. The Huguenot^ Leaders : the Bourbon Princes and Admiral 

Coligny Opposed to the Guises were the Bourbon princes, 

Antony, king of Navarre, and Louis, Prince of Cond^. Next after 
the brothers of Francis II, they were heirs to the French throne. 

Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France, was " the military hero 
of the French Reformation." Early in life he had embraced the 
doctrines of the reformers, and remained to the last the trusted 
and consistent, though ill-starred, champion of the Protestants. 
His is the most heroic figure that emerges from the unutterable 
confusion of the times. 

The foregoing notice of parties and their chiefs will suffice to 
render intelligible the events which we now have to narrate. 

417. The Massacre of Vassy (1562). — After the short reign 
of Francis II (15 5 9-1 5 60) his brother Charles came to the throne 
as Charles IX. He was only ten years of age, so the queen mother 
assumed the government in his name. Pursuing her favorite maxim 
to rule by setting one party as a counterpoise to the other, she 
gave the, Bourbon princes a place in the government, and also by 
a royal edict gave the Huguenots a limited toleration and forbade 
their further persecution. 

2 This word is probably from the German Eidgenossen, meaning " oath comrades." 



3/8 THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE 

These concessions in favor of the Huguenots angered the Cath- 
oHc chiefs, particularly the Guises ; and it was the violation by 
the adherents of the Duke of Guise of the edict of toleration that 
finally caused the growing animosities of the two parties to break 
out in civil war. While passing through the country with a body 
of armed attendants, at a small place called Vassy the duke came 
upon a company of Huguenots assembled in a barn for worship. 
His retainers first insulted and then attacked them, killing about 
forty of the company and wounding many more. 

Under the lead of Admiral Coligny and the Prince of Cond^, 
the Huguenots now rose throughout France. Philip II of Spain 
sent an army to aid the Catholics, while Ehzabeth of England 
extended help to the Huguenots. 

418. The Treaty of St. Germain (1570). — For the lifetime of a 
generation France was distressed, almost without respite, by bitter 
internecine strife.^ The rival princely houses of v/hich we have 
spoken and their respective adherents exploited the situation, — 
that is to say, they took advantage of the religious situation to fur- 
ther their own ends. If one could imagine the Wars of the Roses 
in England carried on in the midst of the ferment of the Refor- 
mation, imagine the houses of York and Lancaster availing them- 
selves of Protestant and Catholic prejudice and fanaticism, one 

8 The table below exhibits the wars of the entire period of which we are treating. 

Some make the religious wars proper end with the Edict of Nantes (1598); others 

with the fall of La Rochelle (1628). 

First War (ended by Peace of Amboise) 1562-1563 

Second War (ended by Peace of Longjumeau) 1567-1568 

Third War (ended by Peace of St. Germain) 1568-1570 

Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day, August 24 1572 

Fourth War (ended by Edict of Boulogne) 1572-1573 

Fifth War (ended by Peace of Monsieur) 1574-1576 

Sixth War (ended by Peace of Bergerac) 1577 

Seventh War (ended by Treaty of Fleix) 1580 

Eighth War (War of the Three Henrys) 15 85-1 589 

Henry of Bourbon, king of Navarre, secures the throne .... 1589 

Ninth War 1589-1598 

Edict of Nantes . 159^ 

Siege and fall of La Rochelle 162 7-1628 

By the fall of La Rochelle the political power of the Huguenots was completely 

prostrated. 



MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY 379 

might thereby get some faint idea of what was going on in France 
during the so-called "Religious Wars." 

The Treaty of St. Germain brought a short and, as it proved, 
delusive peace. The terms of the treaty were very favorable to 
the Huguenots. They received four towns, among which was La 
Rochelle, the stronghold of the Huguenot faith, which they might 
garrison and hold as places of safety and pledges of good faith. 

To cement the treaty, Catherine de' Medici now proposed that 
the Princess Margaret, the sister of Charles IX, should be given 
in marriage to Henry of Bourbon, the new young king of Navarre. 
The announcement of the proposed alliance caused great rejoic- 
ing among Catholics and Protestants alike, and the chiefs of both 
parties crowded to Paris to attend the wedding, which took place 
on the 1 8th of August, 1572. 

419. The Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day (August 24, 1572). 
— Before the festivities which followed the nuptial ceremonies 
were over, the world was shocked by one of the most awful 
crimes recorded by history, — the massacre of the Huguenots in 
Paris on St. Bartholomew's Day. 

The circumstances which led to this fearful tragedy were as 
follows. Among the Protestant nobles who came up to Paris to 
attend the wedding was Admiral Coligny. The admiral had great 
influence over the young king, and this influence he used to draw 
him away from the queen mother and the Guises. Fearing the 
loss of her influence over her son, Catherine resolved upon the 
death of the admiral. The attempt miscarried, Coligny receiving 
only a sHght wound from the assassin's ball. 

The Huguenots rallied about their wounded chief with loud 
threats of revenge. Catherine, driven on by insane fear, now 
determined upon the death of all the Huguenots in Paris as the 
only measure of safety.^ By the 23d of August, the plans for the 
massacre were all arranged. On the evening of that day Catherine 
went to her son and represented to him that the Huguenots had 

* In the midst of the horror and panic of the tragedy the Protestants were led 
to believe that the massacre was the issue of a plot dating from the Treaty of 
St. Germain. The view is now known to be wholly unsupported by the facts. 



38o THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE 

formed a plot for the assassination of the royal family and the 
leaders of the Catholic party, and that the utter ruin of their 
house and cause could be averted only by the immediate destruc- 
tion of the Protestants within the city walls. The order for the 
massacre was then laid before him for his signature. The weak- 
minded king shrank in terror from the deed, and at first refused 
to sign the decree ; but overcome at last by the representations of 
his mother, he exclaimed, " I consent, provided not one Huguenot 
be left alive in France to reproach me with the deed." 

A little past the hour of midnight on St. Bartholomew's Day 
(August 24, 1572), at a preconcerted signal, — the tolling of a 
bell, — the massacre began. Coligny was one of the first victims. 
For three days and nights the massacre went on within the city. 
The number of victims in Paris is variously estimated at from one 
thousand to ten thousand. 

With the capital cleared of Huguenots, orders were issued to 
the principal cities of France to purge themselves in like manner 
of heretics. In many places the decree was disobeyed ; but in 
others the orders were carried out, and frightful massacres took 
place. The number of victims throughout the country is un- 
known ; estimates differ widely, running from two thousand to 
a hundred thousand. 

The massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day raised a cry of execra- 
tion in almost every part of the civilized world, among Catholics 
and Protestants alike. Philip II, however, is said to have received 
the news with unfeigned joy; while Pope Gregory XIII caused 
a Te Deu7?i, in commemoration of the event, to be sung in the 
church of St. Mark in Rome. Respecting this it should in justice 
be said that Catholic writers maintain that the Pope acted under 
a misconception of the facts, it having been represented to him 
that the massacre resulted from a thwarted plot of the Huguenots 
against the royal family of France and the Catholic Church. 

420. Reign of Henry III (1574-1589). — The massacre of 
St. Bartholomew's Day, instead of exterminating heresy in France, 
only served to rouse the Huguenots to a more determined defense 
of their faith. Throughout the last two years of the reign of 



ACCESSION OF HENRY IV 



33i 



Charles IX and the fifteen succeeding years of the reign of his 
brother Henry III the country was in a state of turmoil and war. 
By granting privileges to the Huguenots, Henry angered the 
Catholics, who, for the maintenance of the ancient Church, 
formed what was known as the Holy League, the head of which 
was the third Duke of Guise. Finally, in 1589, the king, who jeal- 
ous of the growing power and popularity of the duke had caused 
him to be assassinated, was himself struck down by the avenging 
dagger of a Dominican monk. With him ended the House of Valois. 

421. Accession of Henry IV (1589). — Henry of Bourbon, king 
Df Navarre, who. for many years had been the most prominent 
leader of the Huguenots, now came to the throne as the first of 
the Bourbon kings. His accession 
lifted into prominence one of the 
most celebrated royal houses in 
European history. The political 
story of France, and indeed of 
Europe, from this -time on to the 
French Revolution, and for some 
time after that, is in great part the 
story of the House of Bourbon. 

Although the doctrines of the 
reformers had made rapid prog- 
ress in France under the sons of 
Henry II, still the great majority 
of the nation at the time of the 
death of Henry III were Catholics 
in faith and worship. Under these 
circumstances we shall hardly 
expect to find the entire nation 
quietly acquiescing in the accession to the French throne of a 
Protestant prince, and he the leader and champion of the hated 
Huguenots. Nor did Henry secure without a struggle the crowri 
that was his by right. The Catholic League had declared for 
Cardinal Bourbon, Henry's uncle, and France was thus kept ip 
the whirl of civil war. 




Fig. 72. — Henry IV, King 
OF France. (From a paint- 
ing by F. Goltzius) 



382 THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE 

422. Henry turns Catholic (1593). — After the war had gone 
on for about four years the quarrel was closed, for the time being, 
by Henry's turning Catholic. Mingled motives led Henry to do 
this. He was personally liked, even by the Catholic chiefs, and 
he was well aware that it was only his Huguenot faith that pre- 
vented their being his hearty supporters. Hence duty and policy 
seemed to concur in urging him to remove the sole obstacle in the 
way of their ready loyalty, and thus to bring peace and quiet to 
distracted France. 

The Catholic League now soon fell to pieces. Henry was crowned 
at Chartres ; and shortly afterwards Paris, which had been in the 
hands of his enemies, opened its gates to him. 

423. The Edict of Nantes (1598). — As soon as Henry had 
become the crowned and acknowledged king of France, he gave 
himself to the work of composing the affairs of his kingdom. 
The most noteworthy of the measures he adopted to this end 
was the publication of the celebrated Edict of Nantes (April 13, 
1598).^ By this decree the Huguenots were secured perfect free- 
dom of conscience and practical freedom of worship.® Schools, 
hospitals, and all public offices and employments were opened to 
them the same as to Catholics. Moreover, they were allowed to 
retain possession of a number of fortified towns as pledges of good 
faith and as places of refuge and defense. Among these places 
was the important city of La Rochelle. 

The granting of this edict is memorable for the reason that it 
was the first formal, though qualiJEied, recognition by a great Euro- 
pean state of the principle of religious toleration and equality.^ 
Here, for the first time since the triumph of Christianity over 
paganism in the Roman Empire, a great nation makes a serious 

5 A few weeks after signing the Edict of Nantes, Henry concluded with Philip II 
the Treaty of Vervins (May 2, 1598), which closed the war with Spain. 

6 The greater nobles were licensed to hold general religious services in their castles ; 
the lesser nobles to hold services for the members of their own families. Altogether 
about 3500 castles were thus made licensed places of Protestant worship. 

7 The provisions of the Peace of Augsburg in 1555 (sec. 347) fell far short, in reli- 
gious liberalism, of the clauses of the edict. Even in the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 
(sec. 433) Germany did not go as far in the direction of religious toleration as France 
had gone in 1598. 



CHARACTER OF HENRY IV'S REIGN 383 

effort to try to get along with two creeds in the state. It was 
almost a century before even England went as far in the way of 
granting freedom of conscience and of worship. 

424. Character of Henry IV' s Reign; his Plans and Death. — ■ 
The temporary hushing of the long-continued quarrels of the 
Catholics and Protestants by the adoption of the principle of 
religious toleration paved the way for a revival of the trade and 
industries of the country, which had been almost destroyed by 
the anarchy and waste of the rehgious wars.. France now entered 
upon such a period of prosperity as she had not known for many 
years. The material and social welfare of all his subjects, particu- 
larly of the lower classes, was Henry's special care. His paternal 
solicitude for his humblest subjects secured for him the title of 
" Father of his People." 

In devising and carrying out his measures of reform, Henry 
was aided by one of the most prudent and sagacious advisers 
that ever strengthened the hands of a prince, — the illustrious 
Duke of Sully (i 560-1641). The duke was an author as well 
as a statesman, arid in his Memoirs left one of the most Valuable 
records we possess of the transactions in which he took so 
prominent a part. 

Remote America was not lost sight of by Henry. In 1608 
Champlain, a Frenchman in the service of a company patronized 
by the king, upon a picturesque cliff four hundred miles up the 
St. Lawrence, founded Quebec, the future political and social 
center of New France. 

Towards the close of his reign Henry, feeling strong in his 
resources and secure in his power, began to revolve in mind vast 
projects for the aggrandizement of France and the weakening of 
her old enemy, the House of Hapsburg, in both its branches.^ 
He was making great preparations for war, when the dagger of 

8 In connection with his designs against the House of Hapsburg, Henry is repre- 
sented in Sully's Memoirs as having had in mind a most magnificent scheme, which 
was nothing less than the organization of all the Christian states of Europe into a 
great confederation or commonwealth, and the aboHtion of war by the creation of 
an international peace tribunal. This scheme is known as the " Grand Design." It is 
not probable, however, that Henry was the author of it, as represented by Sully. 



334 



THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE 



a fanatic by the name of Ravaillac, who regarded Henry as an 
enemy of the Catholic Church, cut short his life and plans (1610). 
425. Louis XIII ( 1 6 1 o- 1 643) ; Cardinal Richelieu and his Policy. 
— As Henry's son Louis, who succeeded him, was a mere child 
of nine years, during his minority the government was adminis- 
tered by his mother, Mary de' Medici. 
Upon attaining his majority, in 161 7, 
Louis took the government into his 
own hands. He chose as his chief 
minister Cardinal Richelieu (1585- 
1642), the Wolsey of France, one of 
the most remarkable characters of the 
seventeenth century. From the time 
that Louis made the prelate his chief 
minister in 1624, the ecclesiastic be- 
came the actual sovereign of France, 
and for the space of eighteen years 
swayed the destinies not only of that 
country, but, it might almost be said, 
those of Europe as well. 

His policy was twofold : first, to 
render ^he authority of the French 
king absolute in France ; second, to 
make the power of France supreme in Europe. 

To attain the first end Richelieu sought (i) to crush the polit- 
ical power of the Huguenots ; (2) to trample out the last vestige 
of independence among the old feudal aristocracy; (3) to sup- 
press or to deprive of all real power the local assemblies and the 
parliaments, or courts of justice. To secure the second end, he 
labored to break down the power of both branches of the House 
of Hapsburg, that is, of Austria and Spain. 

For nearly the lifetime of a generation Richelieu, by intrigue, 
diplomacy, and war, pursued with unrelenting purpose these 
objects of his ambition. In the following paragraph we shall 
speak very briefly of the cardinal's dealings with the Huguenots, 
which feature alone of his policy especially concerns us at present. 




Fig. 73. — Cardinal Riche- 
lieu. (After the painting 
by Philippe de Champagne) 



SIEGE AND CAPTURE OF LA ROCHELLE 385 

426. Siege and Capture of La Rochelle (162 7-1 62 8); Political 
Power of the Huguenots broken. — In the prosecution of his 
plans, one of Cardinal Richelieu's first steps was to break down 
the political power of the Huguenot chiefs, who, dissatisfied with 
their position in the government and irritated by rehgious 
grievances, were revolving in mind the founding in France of a 
Protestant commonwealth like that which the Prince of Orange 
and his adherents had set up in the Netherlands. The capital 
of this new repubhc was to be La Rochelle, on the western coast 
of France. In 1627, an alliance having been formed between 
England and the French Protestants, an EngHsh fleet and army 
were sent 'across the Channel to aid the Huguenot enterprise. 

Richeheu now resolved to ruin forever the power of these Prot- 
estants who, " Protestants first and Frenchmen afterwards," were 
constantly challenging the royal authority and threatening the dis- 
memberment of France. Accordingly, he led in person an army 
to the siege of La Rochelle, which, after a gallant resistance of 
more than a year, was compelled to open its gates (1628). That 
the place might never again be made the center of resistance to 
the royal power, Louis ordered that " the fortifications be razed 
to the ground in such wise that the plow may plow through the 
soil as through tilled land." 

The Huguenots maintained the struggle a few months longer 
in the south of France, but were finally everywhere reduced to 
submission. The result of the war was the complete destruction 
of the political power of the French Protestants. A treaty of peace 
called the Edict of Grace, negotiated the year after the fall of La 
Rochelle, left them, however, freedom of worship, according to 
the provisions of the Edict of Nantes. 

The Edict of Grace properly marks the close of the religious 
wars which had now distressed France for two generations. It is 
estimated that this series of wars cost the country a million lives, 
and that between three and four hundred hamlets and towns 
were destroyed by the contending parties. 

427. Richelieu and the Thirty Years* War. — When Cardinal 
Richeheu came to the head of affairs in France, there was going 



386 THE HUGUENOT WARS IN FRANCE 

on in Germany the Thirty Years' War (i 618-1648), of which we 
shall tell in the following chapter. This was very much such a 
struggle between the Catholic and Protestant German princes and 
cities as we have seen waged between the two religious parties 
in France. 

Although Richelieu had just crushed French Protestantism, he 
now gave assistance to the Protestant German princes because 
their success meant the division of Germany and the humiliation 
of Austria. Richelieu did not live to see the end either of the 
Thirty Years' War or of that which he had begun with Spain ; but 
this foreign policy of the great minister, carried out by others, 
finally resulted, as we shall learn hereafter, in the humiliation of 
both branches of the House of Hapsburg and the lifting of France 
to the first place among the powers of Europe. 

Selections from the Sources. — Duke of Sully, Memoirs (Bohn). 
For a short account of the contents of this work consult Historical Sources 
in Schools (Report to the New England History Teachers' Association, 
pp. 99-102). Translations and Reprints, vol. iii, No. 3, extracts under " The 
Reformation in France" (trans, by Merrick Whitcomb). Old South Leaf- 
lets, No. 91, " The Founding of Quebec (1608)." 

Secondary Works. — Baird, The Rise of the Huguenots, The Huguenots 
and Henry of Navarre, and Theodore Beza. Besant, Gaspard de Coligny. 
^OBl'iiSO'ii,MargaretofAngouleme. ^l'LL'EWT,Hefiry of Navarre. Adams, 
The Growth of the French Nation, chaps, xi and xii. Hassall, 73^*? French 
People, chaps, x and xi. Lodge, Richelieu. Parkman, Pioneers of France 
in the New World ; for the Huguenots in Florida and Brazil, and Champ- 
lain and his associates. See also Fiske, New England and New France, 
.chaps, i-iii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Catherine de' Medici. 2. Admiral 
Coligny and his project of French settlements in Brazil and Florida. 
3. The Duke of Sully. 4. The founding of Quebec. 5. The "Grand 
Design." 



CHAPTER XXV 
THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR (1618-1648) 

428. Nature and Causes of the War. — The long and calamitous 
Thirty Years' War was the last great combat between Protestant- 
ism and Catholicism in Europe. It started as a struggle between 
the Protestant and Catholic princes of Germany, but gradually 
involved almost all the states of the continent, degenerating at 
last into a shameful and heartless struggle for power and territory. 

The real cause of the war was the enmity existing between the 
German Protestants and Catholics. But if a more specific cause 
be sought, it will be found in the character of the articles of the 
celebrated Religious Peace of Augsburg (sec. 347). The Catholics 
and Protestants did not interpret alike the provisions of that com- 
promise treaty. Each party by its encroachments gave the other 
occasion for complaint. The Protestants at length formed for their 
mutual protection a league called the Evangelical Union (1608). 
In opposition to the Union, the CathoHcs formed a confederation 
known as the Holy League (1609). All Germany was thus pre- 
pared to burst into the flames of a religious war. 

429. The Bohemian Period of the War (161 8-1 623). — The 
flames that were to desolate Germany for a generation were first 
kindled in Bohemia, where were still smoldering embers of the 
Hussite wars, which two centuries before had desolated that 
land. A church which the Protestants, relying on the provisions 
of a certain royal charter, maintained they had a right to build 
was torn down by the Catholics, and another was closed. Expos- 
tulations addressed by the reformers to the Emperor Matthias, 
as king of Bohemia, receiving an unsatisfactory reply, a body of 
Bohemian grandees entered the royal castle at Prague and threw 
two of the imperial regents out of the window (May 23, 161 8). 
This hasty proceeding was the beginning of the Thirty Years' 

3^7 



388 THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR 

War, — "the source and cause of all our woes," as wrote one 
who lived in the sad times that followed. 

The Bohemian Protestants now rose in organized revolt against 
their Catholic king, Ferdinand,^ elected a new Protestant king,^ 
and drove out the Jesuits. The war had scarcely opened when, 
the imperial office falling vacant, Ferdinand was elected Emperor. 
With the power he now wielded, together with the help he received 
from the Catholic League, it was not a difficult matter for him 
to quell the Protestant insurrection in his royal dominions. The 
leaders of the revolt were executed, and the reformed faith in 
Bohemia was almost uprooted. 

430. The Danish Period (1625-1629). — The situation of affairs 
at this moment in Germany, with a zealous and powerful Catho- 
lic, inclined and prepared to follow in the footsteps of Charles V, 
at the head of the Germanic body, filled not only the Protestant 
princes of Germany, but all the Protestant powers of the North, 
with the greatest alarm. Christian IV, king of Denmark, sup- 
ported by England and the Dutch Netherlands, now again involved 
in war with Spain, threw himself into the struggle — which was 
still being carried on in a desultory manner — as the champion of 
German Protestantism. On the side of the Catholics were two 
noted commanders, — Tilly, the leader of the forces of the Holy 
League, and Wallenstein, a wealthy Bohemian nobleman, who 
was the commander of the imperial army. What is known as the 
Danish period of the war now begins (1625). 

The war, in the main, proved disastrous to the Protestant allies,^ 
and Christian IV was finally constrained to conclude a treaty of 
peace with the Emperor (Peace of Liibeck, 1629) and retire from 
the struggle. 

By what is known as the Edict of Restitution (1629), the Em- 
peror Ferdinand now restored to the Catholics all the ecclesiastical 

1 Ferdinand was the head of the House of Hapsburg, which family had long held 
the throne of Bohemia. After his election to the imperial office, mentioned a little 
farther on in the text, his title became Emperor Ferdinand II (1619-1637). 

2 Frederick V, Elector Palatine, son-in-law of James I of England. 

3 Among the important episodes of the war were the defeat of the ki ng of Denmark by 
Tilly at Lutter (1626), and the unsuccessful siege of Stralsund by Wallenstein (1628). 



THE SWEDISH PERIOD 



389 



lands and offices in North Germany of which possession had been 
taken by the Protestants in violation of the terms of the Peace 
of Augsburg. 

431. The Swedish Period (i 630-1 635) : Wallenstein, Gustavus 
Adolphus, Tilly — and Wallenstein again. — At this moment of 
seeming triumph, Ferdinand was constrained by rising discontent 
and jealousies to dismiss from his service his most efficient general, 
Wallenstein. Only a few 
months before this, Gus- 
tavus Adolphus, king of 
Sweden, with a veteran and 
enthusiastic army of sixteen 
thousand Swedes, had ap- 
peared in North Germany 
as the champion of the dis- 
pirited and leaderless Prot- 
estants. Various motives 
had concurred in leading 
him thus to intervene in 
the struggle. He was urged 
to this course by his strong 
Protestant convictions and 
sympathies. Furthermore, 
the progress of the imperial 
arms in North Germany was imperiling Swedish interests in the 
Baltic, and threatening to estabhsh the supremacy of the Austrian 
Hapsburgs over what was regarded by the sovereigns of Sweden 
as a Swedish lake. 

• The Protestant princes' jealousy and distrust of the Swede* 
Gustavus now contributed to a most terrible disaster. At this 
moment Tilly was besieging the city of Magdeburg, which had 
dared to resist the Edict of Restitution (sec. 430). But the 
Electors of Brandenburg and Saxony, from whom the city should 
have received help, would not, or at least did not, cooperate 
with Gustavus in raising the siege. In a short time the fated 
city was taken by storm and was given up to sack atfd pillage. 




Fig. 74. — Gustavus Adolphus. (From 
a painting by Vandyke) 



390 THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR 

Thousands of the inhabitants perished miserably. Tilly wrote to 
Ferdinand that since the fall of Troy and Jerusalem such a vic- 
tory had never been seen. " I am sincerely sorry," he adds, 
'' that the ladies of your imperial family could not have been 
present as spectators." 

The cruel fate of Magdeburg excited the alarm of the Protes- 
tant princes. The Electors of Brandenburg and Saxony now united 
their forces with those of the Swedish king. Tilly was defeated 
with great loss in the celebrated battle of Leipzig, or Breitenfeld 
(163 1), and Gustavus, emboldened by his success, pushed south- 
ward into the very heart of Germany. Attempting to dispute his 
march, Tilly's army was again defeated, and he himself received 
a fatal wound (1632). In the death of Tilly, Ferdinand lost his 
most trustworthy general. 

The imperial cause appeared desperate. There was but one 
man in Germany who could turn the tide of victory that was run- 
ning so strongly in favor of the Swedish monarch. That man was 
Wallenstein ; and to him the Emperor now turned. Wallenstein 
agreed to raise an army, provided his control of it should be abso- 
lute. Ferdinand was constrained to grant all that his old general 
demanded. Wallenstein now raised his standard, to which rallied 
the adventurers not only of Germany but of all Europe as well. 
The array was a vast and heterogeneous host, bound together by 
no bonds of patriotism, loyalty, or convictions, but only by the 
spell and prestige of the name of Wallenstein. 

With an army of forty thousand men obedient to his commands, 
Wallenstein, after numerous marches and countermarches, finally 
risked a battle with Gustavus on the memorable field of Liitzen, 
■in Saxony. The Swedes won the day, but lost their leader and 
sovereign (1632). 

We may sum up the results of Gustavus Adolphus' interven- 
tion in the Thirty Years' War in these words of the historian 
Gindely : " He averted the overthrow with which Protestantism 
was threatened in Germany." 

Notwithstanding the death of their great king and commander, 
the Swedes did not withdraw from the war. Hence the struggle 



I 



THE SWEDISH-FRENCH PERIOD 391 

went on, the advantage being for the most part with the Protes- 
tant allies. Ferdinand, at just this time, was embarrassed by the 
suspicious movements of his general Wallenstein. Becoming con- 
vinced that he was meditating the betrayal of the imperial cause, 
the Emperor caused him to be assassinated (1634). This event 
marks very nearly the end of the Swedish period of the war. 

432. The Swedish-French Period (1635-16.48). — Had it not 
been for the selfish and ambitious interference of France, the 
woeful war which had now desolated Germany for half a genera- 
tion might here have come to an end, for both sides were weary 
of it and ready for negotiations of peace. But RicheHeu was not 
willing that the war should end until the House of Austria was 
completely humbled. Accordingly, he encouraged the Swedish 
chancellor Oxenstiern, as he had Gustavus, to carry on the war, 
promising him the aid of the French armies. 

The war thus lost in large part its original character of a con- 
tention between the Catholic and Protestant princes of Germany, 
and became a political struggle between the House of Austria 
and the House of Bourbon, in which the former was fighting for 
existence, the latter for national aggrandizement. 

And so the miserable war went on year after year. It had 
become a heartless and conscienceless struggle for spoils. The 
Swedes fought to fasten their hold upon the mouths of the Ger- 
man rivers, the French to secure a grasp upon the Rhine lands. 
The earlier actors in the drama at length passed from the scene, 
but their parts were carried on by others. 

433. The Peace of Westphalia (1648). — It was just before the 
death of RicheHeu, which occurred in 1642, that the first whisper- 
ings of peace were heard. Everybody was inexpressibly weary of 
the war and longed for the cessation of its horrors, yet each ruler 
and statesman wanted peace on terms advantageous to himself. 
The arrangement of the articles of peace was a matter of infinite 
difficulty, for the affairs and boundaries of the states of Central 
Europe were in almost hopeless confusion. To facilitate matters 
the commissioners were divided into two bodies, one holding its 
sessions at Osnabriick, and the other at Miinster, both Westphalian 



392 



THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR 



cities. After four years of discussion and negotiation, the articles 
of the celebrated Peace of WestphaHa, as it is called, were signed 
by different European powers. The chief articles of this important 
peace may be made to" fall under two heads, — those relating to 
territorial boundaries, and those respecting religion. 

As to the first, these cut short in three directions the actual or 
nominal limits of the Holy Roman Empire. Switzerland and the 
United Netherlands were severed from it; for though both of 
these countries had been for a long time practically independent 
of the Empire, this independence had never been acknowledged 
in any formal way. The claim of France to the three bishoprics 
of Metz, Toul, and Verdun in Lorraine, which places she had held 
for about a century, was confirmed', and all Alsace, save the free 
city of Strasburg, was given to her. These Alsatian lands gave 
France a foothold on the Rhine and an open door into Germany, 
— a door which remained open until 187 1, when Germany, deter- 
mined to possess these valuable lands across her border, went to 
war against France, pushed her back from the river, and seized 
the coveted territory (sec. 714). 

Sweden, already a great maritime power, was given territories 
in North Germany — Western Pomerania and other lands — which 
greatly enhanced her influence by giving her command of the 
mouths of three important German rivers, — the Oder, the Elbe, 
and the Weser. But these lands were not given to the Swedish 
king in full sovereignty; they still remained a part of the Ger- 
manic body, and the king of Sweden through his relation to 
them became a prince of the Empire and entitled to a seat in 
the German Diet. 

The changes within the Empire were many, and some of them 
important. Brandenburg, the nucleus of a future great state, 
especially received considerable additions of territory. She got 
Eastern Pomerania, and also valuable ecclesiastical lands. 

The articles respecting religion were even more important than 
those which established the metes and bounds of the different 
states. CathoHcs, Lutherans, and Calvinists were all put upon the 
same footing. Every prince, with some reservations, was to have 



EFFECTS OF THE WAR UPON GERMANY 393 

the right to make his religion the religion of his people, and to 
banish all who refused to adopt the established creed ; but such 
nonconformists were to have five years in which to emigrate. This 
arrangement was known as the princes' " Right of Reformation " 
and the subjects' " Right of Emigration." * 

The different states of the Empire — they numbered over four 
hundred, counting the free imperial cities — were left almost 
wholly independent of the imperial authority. They were given 
the right to enter into alliances with one another and with foreign 
princes, but not, of course, against the Emperor or the Empire. 
This provision made the Empire merely a loose confederation, and 
postponed to a distant future the nationalization of the German 
fatherland. Germany became what Italy had been, and still was, 
an open field in which any enemy might sow the dragon's teeth of 
discord and war. 

These were some of the most important provisions of the noted 
Peace of Westphalia. For more than two centuries they formed 
the fundamental law of Germany, and established a balance of 
power between the European states which, though it was disre- 
garded and disturbed by Louis XIV of France, was in general 
maintained until the great upheaval of the French Revolution. 

434. Effects of the War upon Germany. — It is impossible to 
picture the wretched condition in which the Thirty Years' War left 
Germany. When the struggle began, the population of the country 
was thirty millions ; when it ended, twelve millions. Two thirds 
of the personal property had been destroyed. Many of the once 
large and flourishing cities were reduced to " mere shells." The 
Duchy of Wtirtemberg, which had half a million of inhabitants at 
the commencement of the war, at its close had barely fifty thou- 
sand. The once powerful Hanseatic League was virtually broken 
up. On every hand were the charred remains of the hovels of the 
peasants and the palaces of the nobility. Vast districts lay waste 
without an inhabitant. The very soil in many regions had reverted 

•* The history of the Palatinate illustrates the workings of this provision of the 
peace : in the space of sixty years the people of that principality were compelled by their 
successive rulers to change their religion four times. But this was an exceptional case. 



394 THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR 

to its primitive wildness. The lines of commerce were broken, 
and some trades and industries swept quite out of existence. 

The effects upon the fine arts, upon science, learning, and morals, 
were even more lamentable. Painting, sculpture, and architecture 
had perished. The cities which had been the home of all these 
arts lay in ruins. Poetry had ceased to be cultivated. Education 
was entirely neglected. For the lifetime of a generation, men 
had been engaged in the business of war, and had allowed their 
children to grow up in absolute ignorance. Moral law was forgot- 
ten. Vice, nourished by the licentious atmosphere of the camp, 
reigned supreme.^ Thus civilization in Germany, which had begun 
to develop with so much promise, received a check from which it 
did not begin to recover, so benumbed were the very senses of 
men, for a generation and more. 

435. Conclusion. — The Peace of Westphalia is a prominent 
landmark in universal history. It stands at the dividing line of 
two great epochs. It marks the end of the Reformation period 
and the beginning of that of the Political Revolution. Henceforth, 
speaking broadly, men will fight for constitutions, not for creeds. 
We shall find them more intent on questions of civil government 
and of political rights than on questions of Church government and 
of religious dogmas. We shall not often see one nation attacking 
another, or one party in a nation assaulting another party, on 
account of a difference in religious opinion.^ 

But in setting the Peace of Westphalia to mark the end of the 
Era of the Reformation, we do not mean to convey the idea that 
men had come to embrace the beneficent doctrine of religious 
toleration. As a matter of fact, no real toleration had yet been 
reached, — nothing save the semblance of toleration. The long 

5 Before the close of the war the number of camp followers on both sides had come 
to exceed that of the fighting men. When on the march the armies resembled the 
migratory hordes of Goths and Vandals that overran the Roman Empire. After the 
war the disbanded soldiers became thieves and brigands, and thousands were exe- 

• cuted. Germany was pestered by these marauding bands for a full century after the 
conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia. 

6 The Puritan Revolution in England may look like a religious war, but we shall 
learn that it was primarily a poUtical contest,— a struggle against despotism in the 
state. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 395 

conflict of a century and more, and the vicissitudes of fortune, 
which to-day gave one party the power of the persecutor and 
to-morrow made the same sect the victims of persecution, had 
simply forced all to the practical conclusion that they must toler- 
ate one another, — that one sect must not attempt to put another 
down by force. But it has required the broadening and liberaliz- 
ing lessons of the two centuries and over that have since passed 
to bring men to see, even in part, that the thing they must do is 
the very thing they ought to do, — to make men tolerant not only 
in outward conduct but in spirit. 

With this single word of caution we now pass to the study of 
the Era of the Political Revolution, a period characterized in 
particular by the growth of divine-right kingship and by the great 
struggle between despotic and liberal principles of government. 

Selections from the Sources. — The student will do well to begin his 
study of the Thirty Years' War by a careful reading of Historical Leaflets 
(Crozer Theological Seminary), No. 5, " The Peace of Augsburg." He will 
here learn how deep-seated and irreconcilable were the differences which 
divided the religious parties in Germany. 

Secondary Works. — Gi^T)¥.-ly, History of the Thirty Years' War. The 
best history for English readers. Chaps, x and xi of vol. ii, bearing upon 
the peace negotiations, are of special interest. Fletcher, Gustavus Adol- 
phus and the Struggle of Protestantism for Existence. Gardiner, The 
Thirty Years' War. Henderson, A Short History of Germany, vol. i, 
chaps, xvii and xviii. Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire, chaps, xviii and 
xix. Fisher, History of the Reformation, chap, xv, summarizes from the 
Protestant side the results of the Reformation ; Balmes, European Civil- 
ization ; Protestantism and Catholicism compared, and Spaulding, The 
History of the Protestant Reformation, Parts I and II, contain discussions 
of the subject from the Catholic point of view. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Articles of the Peace of Augsburg, the 
violation of which caused trouble. 2. Outlawry of the free city of Donau- 
worth. 3. Wallenstein. 4. Tilly and the sack of Magdeburg. 5. Pictures 
of Germany at the end of the war. 



FOURTH PERIOD — THE ERA OF THE 
POLITICAL REVOLUTION 

(From the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648, to the Twentieth Century) 



I. THE AGE OF ABSOLUTE MONARCHY : THE .PRE- 
LUDE TO THE POLITICAL REVOLUTION 
(1648-1789) 

CHAPTER XXVI 

INTRODUCTORY: THE DOCTRINE OF THE DIVINE RIGHT OF 

KINGS AND THE MAXIMS OF THE ENLIGHTENED 

DESPOTS 

436. The Theory of the Divine Right of Kings. — Throughout 
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there was widely held a 
theory of government which during that period probably had as 
great an influence upon the historical development in Europe as 
the theory of the Empire and the Papacy exerted during the 
Middle Ages. This theory is known as the Divine Right of Kings.^ 

According to this theory, the nation is a great family with the 
king as its divinely appointed head. The duty of the king is to 
govern like a father; the duty of the people is to obey their 
king even as children obey their parents. If the king does wrong, 
is cruel, unjust, this is simply the misfortune of his people ; under 
no circumstances is it right for them to rebel against his authority, 

1 It was in England and in France that the theory -was most logically developed, 
and it was in these countries that it exerted its greatest influence upon the political 
evolution. 

396 



THE DIVINE RIGHT OF KINGS 397 

any more than for children to rise against their father. The king 
is responsible to God alone, and to God the people, quietly sub- 
missive, must leave the avenging of all their wrongs. 

This conception of government is so different from our idea of 
it that it will be worth our while to listen to two of the ablest 
champions of the doctrine while they more fully expound it. 

According to the first of these the family is the germ and pro- 
totype of the state. " If we compare the natural rights of a 
father with those of a king," — it is the old English writer Filmer 
who speaks,^ — "we find them all one, without any difference at 
all but only in the latitude or extent of them : as the father over 
one family, so the king, as father over many families, extends his 
care to preserve, feed, clothe, instruct, and defend the whole 
commonwealth. His war, his peace, his courts of justice, and all 
his acts of sovereignty tend only to preserve and distribute to 
every subordinate and inferior father, and to their children, their 
rights and privileges, so that all the duties of a king are summed 
up in an universal fatherly care of his people." 

Heredity points out the legitimate king : " It is unnatural for 
the multitude to choose their governors, or to govern or to par- 
take in the government." 

The power of the hereditary king is absolute : " For as kingly 
power is by the law of God, so it hath no inferior law to 
limit it." 

The king can neither be corrected nor deposed by his subjects : 
" For, indeed, it is the rule of Solomon that ' We must keep the 
king's commandment,' and not say, 'What dost thou?' because 
* where the word of a king is there is power,' and all that he 
pleaseth he will do. . . . Not that it is right for kings to do 
injury, but it is right for them to go unpunished by the people if 
they do it. . . . It will be punishment sufficient for them to 
expect God as a revenger." ^ 



2 In his Patriarcha. See Sources at end of chapter. 

3 Filmer is here quoting the words of the celebrated English jurist Bracton 
(d. 1268). All that the people can do when the king misuses his authority is to peti- 
tion him " to amend his fault " — and " to pray to God." 



398 DIVINE-RIGHT KINGSHIP 

"Kings are the ministers of God" — it is the eloquent Bos- 
suet, the court chaplain of Louis XIV, who now speaks * — " and 
his vicegerents on the earth." " The throne of a king is not the 
throne of a man, but the throne of God himself. . . . The per- 
son of kings is sacred, and it is sacrilege to harm them." * 
"They are gods, and partake in some fashion of the divine 
independence." ® 

With Filmer, Bossuet maintains the subject's duty of passive 
obedience. He who does not obey his prince is worthy of death 
as the enemy of society. Rebellion against kings is sacrilege : 
"The holy anointment is on them and the high office they exer- 
cise in the name of God protects them from all insult." 

At first the upholders of this theory of the nature and powers 
of the kingly office were apt to seek support for it in biblical 
texts j but later its defenders came to rely more on pure argu- 
ment, as is illustrated by Filmer's syllogism : " What is natural to 
man exists by divine right; kingship is natural to man; there- 
fore, kingship exists by divine right." ^ 

Before the close of the period upon which we here enter, we 
shall see how this theory of the divine right of kings worked out 
in practice, — how dear it cost both kings and people, and how 
the people by the strong logic of revolution demonstrated that 
they have a divine and inalienable right to govern themselves.^ 

437. History of the Doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings. — 
This theory that kings rule by divine right has a history well 

* In his Politique tiree des fropres paroles de /' Ecriture Sainte (CEuvres com- 
pletes, vol. xxiii, Paris, 1875), p. 533. 

S Ibid., p. 534. 6 Ihid.., p. 559. See Psalms Ixxxii. 6. 

"^ See Figgis, The Theory of the Divine Right of Kings, p. 153. 

8 There was much in the history of the Middle Ages to convince men that abso- 
lute monarchy, if not a divinely appointed form of government, was at least the best 
form. Every other form had been tried and found wanting, having issued either in 
tyranny or in anarchy. Witness the intolerable oppression of the aristocratic govern- 
ment of the feudal lords ; witness the tyranny of the theocratic government of the 
priesthood ; witness the turbulence of society under the democratic r6gime of the Italian 
cities. Peace and security within the state had been secured only through the growth 
of the royal power. Hence the political axiom of this age, an age just escaping 
from feudal anarchy, was that of the Homeric Greeks, — " The rule of many is not 
a good thing; let there be one leader only, one king." 



THE DIVINE RIGHT OF KINGS 399 

worth tracing. Among primitive peoples, like the early Greeks, 
we find the king ruHng by divine right, — by right of his descent 
from the gods. In Egypt the Pharaoh was regarded as partaking 
of the divine nature. In ancient Judea the king was the Lord's 
anointed, and ruled as his vicegerent on earth. In the days of 
the Roman emperors their subjects in the East were prone to 
regard the head of the Empire as set apart from ordinary men. 
They built temples in honor of " the divine Caesar." 

But to trace the origin of the doctrine as applied to kings of 
modern times, we need not go farther back than to the establish- 
ment of the mediaeval Papacy. The popes, as we have learned, 
ruled by what may be termed divine right. All acknowledged 
their office and authority to be of divine origin and appointment. 
But when the emperors of German origin got into controversy 
with the popes in regard to the relation of the imperial to the 
papal power, then it was that the supporters of the emperors 
framed the counter-theory of the divine origin of the imperial 
authority. Thus Dante in his De Monarchia argues for the 
supernatural character of the imperial power, and maintains that 
the Emperor rules as much by divine right as does the Pope. 
Then later in the fourteenth century, after the Empire had been 
practically destroyed by the Papacy and the kings had taken up 
the fight against the papal see, their supporters naturally began 
to preach the doctrine of the divine nature of the royal authority. 
This was the starting point of the theory in its modern form. 

When finally the Reformation came and with it even still 
keener strife between the lay rulers of the revolted nations and 
the Roman see, then the theory of the divine nature of the royal 
power received perforce a great expansion. For when the Pope 
excommunicated a heretic king and exhorted his subjects to take 
up arms against him, then the royalist writers and preachers pro- 
claimed more loudly than ever and with passiotiate fervor the 
doctrine of the divine right of princes and the wickedness of 
disobedience and rebellion. Fostered in this way, the doctrine 
of the sacred character of kingship and the virtue of passive 
obedience in the subject struck deep and firm root. 



400 DIVINE-RIGHT KINGSHIP 

438. Character of the Absolute Sovereigns and their Relation 
to the Political Revolution. — What use did the kings make of 
the vast and unlimited authority with which the circumstances 
of history and the growth of political theory had invested them? 
As a class, they made a betrayal of the great trust. Too many 
of them acted upon the maxim of Louis XIV of France, — '' Self- 
aggrandizement is at once the noblest and the most agreeable 
occupation of kings." They seemed to think that their subjects 
were made for their use ; that the public strength and the public 
revenues might be freely used by them for the attainment of 
purely personal ends, the promotion of purely personal ambi- 
tions. War became a royal pastime. A great part of the bloody 
wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which centuries 
may be regarded as covering roughly the age of absolute mon- 
archy, were wars that originated in frivolous personal jealousies, 
in wicked royal ambitions, or in disputes respecting dynastic suc- 
cession. So generally did the wars of this period spring from ques- 
tions of the latter nature, that by some historians the age is called 
the Era of Dynastic Wars.® The teachings of the The Prince of 
Machiavelli ruled the period. 

Now, all this misuse of royal power, all these unholy wars with 
their trains of attendant evils, did much to discredit divine-right 
kingship and to bring in government by the people. " Bad kings 
help us," Emerson affirms, " if only they are bad enough." Many 
of the kings of this period were bad enough to be supremely 
helpful to us. It was during this age of the kings that the forces 
set loose by the Renaissance and the Reformation engendered 
the tempest which overwhelmed forever divine-right kingship and 
its gilded appendage of privileged aristocracy. 

9 There is need of caution here, however. Not all the wars of this age were frivo- 
lous, artificial, or personal. There were, as we shall see, wars involving great issues 
and principles, — questions of systems of government and forms of civilization. The 
war in England between the ParUament and the king was the first act in the drama 
of the Political Revolution; and the Seven Years' War (1756-1763) was a struggle 
involving as momentous questions as were ever arbitrated by the sword. Commercial 
and colonial interests too were coming to be more generally the concern of govern- 
ments, and some of the greatest wars of the eighteenth century had their origin in 
national jealousies touching trade and colonies. 



THE ENLIGHTENED DESPOTS 401 

439. The Enlightened Despots. — But not all the kings of this 
age were imbecile or wicked. There were among them many wise 
and benevolent rulers. Especially during the latter part of the 
eighteenth century did there appear monarchs known as the 
Enlightened Despots, who, under the influence of the teachings 
of French philosophy, came to entertain reasonable views of their 
duties and of their obligations to their subjects. 

These sovereigns did not give up the idea that unlimited mon- 
archy is the best form of government and that the people should 
have no part in public affairs. They sincerely believed that the 
power of the king should be unHmited, but they emphasized the 
doctrine that this power should be exercised solely in the interest 
of the people. The public revenues should be expended on 
public works, and public officials should be appointed solely on 
the ground of their ability and fitness. Thus the idea of the royal 
power being a trust, the royal office a stewardship, was made 
prominent. The king became the servant of his people. 

The great place which the rulers of this disposition held in the 
history of the century immediately preceding the French Revo- 
lution is indicated by these words of the historian Professor H. 
Morse Stephens : " The most characteristic feature in government 
of the eighteenth century," he says, "was the existence and the 
work of the enlightened despots." 

Most prominent among the sovereigns deemed worthy a place 
among the enlightened despots are Catherine the Great of Russia, 
Frederick the Great of Prussia, and Joseph II of Austria. Con- 
cerning them and their work we shall have something to say in 
following chapters. It will suffice here if we simply observe that 
the issue of this great experiment in government illustrated anew 
what had been demonstrated by the rule of the Tyrants in the 
cities of ancient Greece, and by that of the Caesars at Rome, — 
namely, that absolute power cannot safely be lodged in the hands 
of a single person. It is certain sooner or later to be misused. 

As it has been well put, absolute power in a single person is a 
good thing when joined with perfect wisdom and perfect good- 
ness. But unfortunately these qualifications of the ideal autocrat 



402 DIVINE-RIGHT KINGSHIP 

are seldom found united in the same individual, and still less 
seldom are they transmitted from father to son. It is at just this 
point that absolute hereditary monarchy, as a practical form of 
government, breaks down beyond hope and without remedy. 

Selections from the Sources. — Filmer, Patriarcha. This work, which 
was first published in 1680, is the classical English treatise in exposition 
and defense of divine-right kingship. For a short selection from King 
James, Law of Free Monarchies, see Lee, Source-Book, pp. 337, 338. 

Secondary Works. — Figgis, The Theory of the Divine Right of Kings. 
An able and interesting discussion of the subject. The book has a good 
bibliography. Gairdner and Spedding, Studies in English History ; con- 
tains a valuable essay entitled, "The Divine Right of Kings: History of 
the Doctrine." This essay is a reprint of an article by Dr. Gairdner in The 
Contemporary Review for September, 1869. Stephens, Syllabus of Lectures 
on Modern European History, Lect. li, " The Enlightened Despots " ; sug- 
gests important viewpoints. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The deification of the Roman emperors. 
2. Dante's argument in his De Monarchia for the supernatural character 
of the imperial office. 3. The reforms of the enlightened despots. See 
Stephens. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

THE ASCENDANCY OF FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 
(1643-1715) 

440. Louis XIV as the Typical Divine-Right King. — Louis XIV 
of France stands as the representative of divine-right monarchy. 
He shall himself expound to us his conception of government.^ 
These are his words: "To attribute to subjects the right of 
forming resolutions and of giving commands to their sovereign 
is to pervert the true order of things. It is to the head alone 
that pertains the right to deliberate and to resolve upon; the 
whole duty of subjects consists in the carrying into eifect of the 
commands given them." ^ " Kings are absolute lords ; to them 
belongs naturally the full and free disposal of all the property 
of their subjects, whether they be churchmen or laymen." ^ " For 
subjects to rise against their prince, however wicked and oppres- 
sive he may be, is always infinitely criminal. God, who has given 
kings to men, has willed that they should be revered as his lieu- 
tenants, and has reserved to Himself alone the right to review 
their conduct. His will is that he who is born a subject should 
obey without question." * 

The doctrine here set forth Louis is said to have expressed in 
this terser form : BE tat c'est mot, " I am the State." He may 

1 It should be noted that Louis' subjects, at least the great majority of them, also 
believed in government by one, — and not without reason. They had had sorry experi- 
ence with government by many, under the regime of the nobles. Of government by 
all, by themselves, it was not possible for them to have any clear conception, if any 
conception at all. It needed a hundred years and more of autocratic misrule and 
oppression to call into existence that revolutionary idea. 

2 (Euvres de Louis XIV (Paris, 1806), tome ii, p. 26. 

3 Ibid., p. 121. Louis adds, however, that what kings take from their subjects they 
should use as wise stewards, — that is to say, for the promotion of the public welfare. 

4 Ibid., p. 336. 

403 



404 FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

never have uttered these exact words, but the famous epigram at 
least embodies perfectly his ideas of kingship. In his own view 
he was by divine commission the sole legislator, judge, and execu- 
tive of the French nation. 

This theory of government thus expounded by Louis was in- 
deed, as we have seen, no novel doctrine to the Europe of the 
seventeenth century; but Louis was such an ideal autocrat that 
somehow he made autocratic government attractive. Other rulers 
imitated him, and it became the prevailing theory that kings have 
a "divine right" to rule, and that the people should have no part 
at all in government. 

441. The Administration of Mazarin (1643— 1661). — The reli- 
gious war in Germany was still in progress when, in 1643, Louis 
XIII died, leaving the vast authority which his great minister 
Cardinal Richelieu had done so much to consoHdate, as an inher- 
itance to his little son Louis, a child of five years. 

During the prince's minority the government was in the hands 
of his mother, Anne of Austria, as regent. She chose as her chief 
minister an Italian ecclesiastic, Cardinal Mazarin, who in his 
administration of affairs followed in the footsteps of his prede- 
cessor, Richelieu, carrying out with great abihty the comprehen- 
sive policy of that minister. France was encouraged to maintain 
her part — and a very glorious part it was, as war goes — in the 
Thirty Years' War until Austria was completely exhausted and all 
Germany indeed almost ruined. Even after the Peace of West- 
phaha, which simply concluded the war in Germany, France 
carried on the war with Spain for ten years longer, until 1659, 
when the Treaty of the Pyrenees, which gave the French the two 
provinces of Roussillon and Artois, together with a part of Flan- 
ders, asserted the triumph of France over Spain. RicheUeu's 
policy had at last, though at terrible cost to France,^ been 

5 The heavy taxes laid to meet the expenses of the wars created great discontent, 
which during the struggle with Spain led to a series of conspiracies or revolts against 
the government, known as the Wars of the Fronde (1648-1652). This was a dying 
effort on the part of the nobles, the hereditary magistrates, and the middle classes to 
curb the growing power of the crown. The movement lacked seriousness and true 
leadership, and resulted only in making more oppressive the absolutism against which 
it was directed. 



LOUIS XIV ASSUMES THE GOVERNMENT 



405 



"'/'/yy, / 



crowned with success. The House of Austria in both its branches 
had been humihated and crippled, and the House of Bourbon was 
ready to assume the lead in European affairs. 

442. Louis XIV assumes the Government. — Cardinal Mazarin 
died in 1661. Upon this event Louis, who was now twenty- three 
years of age, called together the heads of the various departments 
of the government, and, directing his words to the Chancellor, 
said : " I have summoned you with my ministers and secretaries 
of state, to tell you that it 
has pleased me hitherto to 
leave my affairs in the hands 
of the late cardinal; in the 
future I shall attend to them 
myself. You will give me 
your counsel when I ask for 
it." He then charged the 
Chancellor not to set seal to 
any document without his 
express orders ; and warned 
the secretaries not to sign 
any paper, not even a pass- 
port, without his express 
commands. 

From this time on for 
more than half a century 
Louis was his own prime 
minister. He gave personal 
attention to every matter, 
even the most trivial. Prob- 




FiG. 75.— Louis XIV. (After a paint- 
ing by Philippe de Champagne) 



ably no wearer of a crown, Philip II of Spain possibly excepted, 
ever worked harder at "the trade of a king," as he himself desig- 
nated his employment. He had able men about him, but they 
planned and worked — and sometimes chafed — under his minute 
directions and tireless superintendence. 

443. Louis' Chief Aims; ^ The history of Louis' long reign will 
present coherence and unity only as we fix clearly in view the 



4o6 FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

ends towards which his efforts were mainly directed. His first aim 
was to make himself absolute master in his own kingdom. In his 
" Instructions to the Dauphin " he says, " The necessary basis of 
all other reforms was the rendering of my own will absolute." 
This basis was well laid. Under Louis there was but one will in 
France, — the will of the king. The nobility, the States-General, 
all local authorities, the Parliament of Paris,^ the Church, — all 
these classes and bodies were shorn of the last remnants of polit- 
ical influence and power and rendered servilely submissive to 
the crown. 

Louis' second aim was to secure for France the headship of 
Europe, — to transfer European leadership and the imperial crown 
itself from the House of Hapsburg to the House of Bourbon. We 
shall see in how many sanguinary wars Louis involved almost all 
Europe in his efforts to realize this object of his ambition. 

444. Colbert. — Mazarin is reported to have said to Louis when 
dying, " Sire, I owe everything to you ; but I pay my debt to 
your majesty by giving you Colbert." During the first ten or 
twelve years of Louis' personal reign this extraordinary man in- 
spired and directed almost everything ; but he carefully avoided 
the appearance of doing so. His maxim seemed to be. Mine the 
labor, thine the praise. He did for the domestic affairs of France 
what Richelieu had done for the foreign. 

So long as Louis followed the policy of Colbert, he gave France 
a truly glorious reign; but unfortunately he soon turned aside 
from the great minister's policy of peace, to seek glory for him- 
self and greatness for France through new and unjust encroach- 
ments upon neighboring nations. 

445. The Wars of Louis XIV. — During the period of his per- 
sonal administration of the government, Louis XIV was engaged 

6 This was a French court of justice which attempted to assume political func- 
tions, — which sometimes seemed to aspire to become for France what the English 
Parliament was for England. One of its duties was to register the royal edicts, 
which were given validity only by such registration. Sometimes the court hesitated 
to register the king's decrees, and made remonstrances. Louis ordained that the court 
should register all decrees without delay. It might make remonstrances afterwards. 
The court was forced to bow to the royal will. 




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WAR OF THE SPANISH NETHERLANDS 407 

in four great wars : (i) a war respecting the Spanish Netherlands 
(1667-1668); (2) a war with the Protestant Netherlands (1672- 
1678); (3) the War of the Palatinate, or of the League of Augs- 
burg (i 688-1697); and (4) the War of the Spanish Succession 
(1701-1714). All these wars were, on the part of the French 
monarch, wars of conquest and aggression, or wars provoked by 
his ambitious and encroaching policy. The most inveterate enemy 
of Louis during all this period was the Dutch Republic, the repre- 
sentative and champion of liberty. 

446. The War concerning the Spanish Netherlands (1667- 
1668). — Upon the death in 1665 of Philip IV of Spain, Louis 
laid claim, in the name of his wife,'' to portions of the Spanish 
Netherlands and led an army into the country. The Hollanders 
were naturally alarmed, fearing that Louis would also want to 
annex their country to his dominions. Accordingly they effected 
what was called the Triple Alliance with England and Sweden, 
checked the French king in his career of conquest, and, by the 
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1668, forced him to give up much 
of the territory he had seized. He retained, however, a number 
of Flemish towns along the French frontier, which he made by 
extensive fortifications, planned by his celebrated military engineer 
Vauban, the strong outposts of his kingdom in that direction. 

447. The War with the Protestant Netherlands (167 2-1 678). 
— The second war of the French king was against the United 
Netherlands. His attack upon this little state was prompted by 
a variety of motives. In the first place, the Hollanders' interven- 
tion in the preceding war had stirred his resentment. Then these 
Dutchmen represented everything to which he was opposed, — 
self-government, Protestantism, and free thought. 

Before entering upon the undertaking which had proved too 
great for PhiHp II with the resources of two worlds at his com- 
mand, Louis, by means of bribes and the employment of that 
skillful diplomacy of which he was so perfect a master, prudently 

7 Maria Theresa, the only child of Philip IV by his first marriage. At the time of 
her betrothal to Louis she had renounced all her rights in the Netherlands, but since 
a promised dowry had never been paid, Louis argued that this renunciation was void 



4o8 FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

drew away from the side of Holland both her alhes (Sweden and 
England), even inducing the English king, Charles II, to lend 
him active assistance. Money also secured the aid of several of 
the princes of Germany. 

Thus the little commonwealth was left alone to contend against 
fearful odds. The stubborn resistance offered the invading French 
armies by the Hollanders in their half-drowned land, — with the 
French threatening Amsterdam, the dikes had been cut, — the 
havoc wrought by the stout Dutch sailors among the fleets of 
the allies, and the diplomacy of the Dutch statesmen, who through 
skillful negotiations detached almost all the allies of the French' 
from that side and brought them into alliance with the Republic, 

— all these things soon put a very different face upon affairs, and 
Louis found himself confronted by the armies of half of Europe. 

For several years the war was now waged on land and sea, 

— in the Netherlands, all along the Rhine, upon the English Chan- 
nel, in the Mediterranean, and on the coasts of the New World. 
Finally, an end was put to the struggle by the Peace of Nimeguen 
(1678). Louis gave up his conquests in Holland, but kept a large 
number of towns and fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands, be- 
sides the free county of Burgundy (Franche-Comte), on his east- 
ern frontier. 

Thus Louis came out of this tremendous struggle, in which 
half of Europe was leagued against him, with enhanced reputa- 
tion and fresh acquisitions of territory. People began to call 
him the ''Grand Monarch"; we shall see directly by what acts 
he justified their judgment in conferring upon him this title. 

448. Louis seizes the City of Strasburg (1681). — Ten years 
of comparative peace now followed for Western Europe. Among 
the many indefensible acts of Louis during this period there 
were two which deserve special notice, since, while marking the 
culmination of Louis' power and illustrating his arrogant and 
unjust use of that power, they also mark the turning point in 
his fortunes. 

The first of these was the seizure of the free city of Strasburg 
and a score of other important places on the left bank of the 



REVOCATION OF THE EDICT OF NANTES 409 

Rhine belonging to the Empire. "Gold, intrigue, and terror" 
opened the gates of all these cities to him.^ Strasburg was of 
supreme military importance to Louis on account of her strong 
fortifications, which rendered her mistress of the Rhine. 

The audacity of Louis' procedure so dazed every one that no 
effective protest was made. Besides, at just this time the Em- 
peror was preoccupied with the Turks. In 1683 they laid siege to 
Vienna. All Christendom awaited anxiously the outcome. Fortu- 
nately the siege was raised by the celebrated Polish king, John 
Sobieski^ and the House of Austria was saved. But the Turks 
continued to threaten the eastern territories of Austria, so that it 
was impossible for the Emperor to intervene in any effective way 
to prevent Louis from consummating his schemes for the absorp- 
tion of the Rhenish lands which he needed to round out his 
dominions in that quarter. 

449. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). — The 
second act to which we refer — an act the injustice of which 
was only equaled by its folly — was the revocation of the Edict 
of Nantes, the gracious decree by which Henry IV guaranteed 
religious freedom to the French Protestants (sec. 423). 

Louis' motives in persecuting his Protestant subjects were 
essentially the same as those which had led Philip III of Spain 
to expel from his dominions his Morisco subjects. He believed 
the extirpation of heresy to be a service pleasing to God, and 
he coveted the honor of rooting it out of France. 

The revocation of the edict was not the result of a sudden 
resolve. Almost from the beginning of his personal rule Louis 
had shown a persecuting spirit. He had placed unfair con- 
struction upon the clauses of the edict and had subjected the 
Huguenots to many annoying restrictions. Since 1683 he had 
harassed them by a device known as the " Dragonnades," from 
the circumstance that dragoons were quartered upon the Prot- 
estant famihes, with full permission to annoy and persecute them 
in every way " short of violation and death," to the end that the 

8 To lend a color of legality to his acts, Louis, before making these seizures, had 
had his claims to them passed upon by courts known as " Chambers of Reunion." 



4IO FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

victims of these outrages might be constrained to recant, which 
multitudes did. 

The fateful royal decree revoking the edict of toleration was 
issued in 1685. By this cruel measure all the Protestant churches 
were closed, and every Huguenot who refused to embrace the 
Catholic faith was outlawed. The ministers of the heretical sect 
were expelled from the kingdom ; laymen, on the other hand, were 
forbidden to leave the country. Any one attempting to do so, if 
apprehended, was to be sent to the galleys for life. 

Disregarding the royal prohibition and evading the vigilance of 
the police, great numbers of the persecuted Huguenots made their 
way out of the country. It is estimated that before the end of the 
seventeenth century Louis had lost as many as three hundred thou- 
sand of the most skillful and industrious of his subjects. 

The effects upon France of the exodus were most disastrous. 
Several of the most important and flourishing of the French indus- 
tries were ruined, while the manufacturing interests of other coun- 
tries, particularly those of the Protestant Netherlands, England, 
and Brandenburg, were correspondingly benefited by the energy, 
skill, and capital which the exiles carried to them. Many of the 
fugitive Huguenots ultimately found new homes in remote South 
Africa, and their descendants contributed greatly to the strength 
of the republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. 
Many others sought refuge in America; and no other class of 
emigrants, save the Puritans of England, cast 

Such healthful leaven 'mid the elements 
That peopled the new world.^ 

450. The War of the Palatinate, or of the League of Augsburg 

(1688-1697). — The indirect results of the revocation of the 
Edict of Nantes were quite as calamitous to France as were the 
direct results. The indignation that the measure awakened among 
the Protestant nations contributed to enable William of Orange 
to organize a formidable confederacy against Louis, known as the 
League of Augsburg (1686). 

9 See Baird, History of the Huguenot Emigration to America, 



WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION 411 

Louis resolved to attack the confederates. Seeking a pretext for 
beginning hostilities, he laid claim, on the part of his sister-in-law, 
to properties in the Palatinate, and hurried a large army into the 
country, which was quickly overrun. But being unable to hold 
the conquests he had made, Louis ordered that the country be 
laid waste. Among the places reduced to ruins were the historic 
towns of Heidelberg, Spires, and Worms. Even fruit trees, vines, 
and crops were destroyed. Upwards of a hundred thousand peas- 
ants were rendered homeless. 

Another and more formidable coalition, known as the Grand 
Alliance, was now formed against Louis (1689). It embraced 
England, Holland, Sweden, Spain, Savoy, the Emperor, the Elec- 
tor Palatine, and the Electors of Bavaria and Saxony. 

For ten years almost all Europe was a great battlefield. It was 
very much such a struggle as that waged a century later by the 
allied monarchies of Europe against Napoleon, when they fought 
for the independence of the continent. 

Both sides at length becoming weary of the contest and almost 
exhausted in resources, the struggle was closed by the Peace of 
Ryswick (1697). There was a mutual surrender of conquests 
made during the course of the war, and Louis had also to give up 
many of the places he had seized before the beginning of the 
conflict. He managed, however, to retain, along with some other 
places, the important city of Strasburg. 

451. War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714). — Barely 
three years had passed after the Peace of Ryswick before the 
great powers of Europe were involved in another war, knowii as 
the War of the Spanish Succession. 

The proximate circumstances out of which the' war grew were 
these. In 1 700 the king of Spain, Charles II, the last male descend- 
ant in Spain of the great Emperor Charles V, died, leaving his 
crown — the disposition of which had been made a matter of end- 
less discussion and infinite intrigue, for Charles was childless — 
to Philip, Duke of Anjou, a grandson of Louis XIV. The duke, 
a mere lad of seventeen years, assumed the bequeathed crown 
with the title of Philip V, and thus became the founder of the 



412 



FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 



Bourbon dynasty in Spain. "There are no longer any Pyrenees," 
is the way in which Louis is reported to have expressed his exul- 
tation over this virtual union of France and Spain. 

France, through Spanish favor, might also now easily become 
supreme in~the colonial world and realize her dream of a great 
colonial empire. The common danger led to the forming of a sec- 
ond Grand Alliance ^° against France, a main object of which was 
to eject Philip from the Spanish throne and to seat thereon the 

Archduke Charles of Austria, the 
second son of the Emperor 
Leopold I.^^ The two greatest 
generals of the allies were the Duke 
of Marlborough (John Churchill), 
the ablest commander, except 
Wellington perhaps, that England 
has ever produced, and Prince 
Eugene of Savoy, who was in the 
imperial service. 

For thirteen years all Europe 
was shaken with war. During the 
progress of the struggle were 
fought some of the most memor- 
able battles in European history, — 
Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde, 
and Malplaquet, — in all of which the genius of Marlborough and 
the consummate skill of Prince Eugene won splendid victories 
for the alHes. 

In the year 17 ii, a vacancy ha^dng occurred in the imperial 
office, the Archduke Charles was elected Emperor. This changed 
the whole aspect of the Spanish question, for now to place Charles 
upon the Spanish throne would be to give him a dangerous pre- 
ponderance of power ; would be, in fact, to reestablish the great 




Fig. 76. — Duke of Marl- 
borough. (After a painting 
by F. Kneller) 



10 The alliance embraced at first England, the Protestant Netherlands, Austria, 
and other German states, and later was joined by Portugal and Savoy. 

11 It was not, however, until the second year of the alliance that the powers form- 
ally acknowledged the archduke as king of Spain. 



NEW FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 413 

monarchy of Charles V. Consequently the Grand Alliance, 
already weakened from other causes, fell to pieces, and the war 
was ended by the treaties of Utrecht (17 13) and Rastadt (17 14). 

By the provisions of these treaties the Bourbon prince, Philip 
of Anjou, was left upon the Spanish throne, but on the condition 
that there should never be a union of the French and Spanish 
crowns upon the same head. His dominions also were pared 
away on every side. Gibraltar and the island of Minorca were 
ceded to England ; Milan, Naples, the island of Sardinia, and the 
Catholic Netherlands were given to Austria; and Sicily to the 
Duke of Savoy. Spain was thus shorn of nearly half her territories 
in Europe. 

France also suffered in her colonial possessions and claims, 
being forced to cede Nova Scotia (Acadia) to England and to 
admit her sovereignty over Newfoundland and the Hudson Bay 
Territory.12 

452. New France under Louis XIV In examining the main 

articles of the treaties which closed the War of the Spanish Suc- 
cession, one cannot fail to be impressed by the revelation of how 
decisively the New World was at that time beginning to react 
upon the Old. Indeed, from the opening of the eighteenth cen- 
tury forward the affairs of America were destined to become con- 
stantly more and more closely intertwined with those of Europe, 
so much so as regards France and England that their respective 
histories in the eighteenth century can be read aright only in the 
light of these new relations. We shall therefore do well if we here 
turn our eyes from following the course of events in Europe and 
cast a glance upon the situation of things in the New World. 

Louis had dreams of a splendid French empire beyond the seas. 
With such paternal solicitude did he watch over the growth of the 
French transatlantic settlements that he earned the title of " Father 
of New France." -^^ Year after year shiploads of emigrants were 

12 For the celebrated clause concerning the " Assiento," see sec. 531. 

13 Asia was not forgotten. The French established themselves at Surat, in India, 
in 1667, and at Pondicherry in 1672. To encourage the nobles to engage in colonial 
trade, Louis issued an edict ordaining that it should not be regarded as " derogatory 
to the nobility to take part in commerce with the Indies." 



414 FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

sent out at the expense of the crown. The population along the 
St. Lawrence thickened slowly yet steadily, and a chain of forts 
and settlements was formed stretching from the Great Lakes 
along the Ohio and the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. 

But several things intervened to prevent Louis from becoming 
the maker of a great and permanent French empire in America. 
In the first place, he subordinated these over-the-sea interests 
to his ambitious European policy. Hence the resources which 
should have been used in fostering colonial enterprises were 
wasted in unjust and comparatively fruitless wars at home. 

In the second place, the French colony in Canada never grew 
and gained in strength in the way that the English settlements 
did, because the French settlers never breathed the air of liberty. 
They were allowed no initiative; everything was planned and 
executed for them. They were treated like children. This pater- 
nalism smothered all worthy individual aspiration and enterprise. 

In the third place, the unfortunate bigotry of Louis and of his 
advisers stood in the way of the success of the undertaking. The 
colony was closed against all save Catholic immigrants. This was 
a suicidal policy. Had the French territories, like the English 
colonies, been open to religious dissenters. New France would 
doubtless have received a large and steady stream of Huguenot 
emigrants, and therewith such an accession of strength as might 
possibly have given a wholly different issue to the great struggle 
which, soon after Louis had passed from the stage, began between 
the English and the French for supremacy in America. 

453. Death of the King (17 15). — It was amidst troubles, per- 
plexities, and afflictions that Louis XIV's long and eventful reign 
drew to a close. The heavy and constant taxes necessary to meet 
the expenses of his numerous wars, to maintain an extravagant 
court, and to furnish means for the erection of costly buildings, 
had bankrupted the country, and the cries of his wretched sub- 
jects, clamoring for bread, could not be shut out of the royal 
chamber. Death, too, had invaded the palace, striking down the 
Dauphin and also two grandsons of Louis, leaving as the nearest 
heir to the throne his great-grandson, a mere child. On the 



THE COURT OF LOUIS XIV 415 

morning of Sept. i, 1 715, the Grand Monarch breathed his last, 
bequeathing to this boy of five years a kingdom overwhelmed with 
debt, and filled with misery, with threatening vices, and dangerous 
discontent. He seemed at the last moment to be sensible of the 
mistakes and faults of his reign, for his dying charge to the little 
prince who was to succeed him was as follows : " Do not follow 
the bad example which I have set you. I have undertaken war too 
lightly, and have continued it from vanity. Do not imitate me, 
but be a pacific prince, and let your chief occupation be to relieve 
your subjects." 

The tidings of the king's death, instead of being received by 
his subjects with tears, was received throughout France with an 
outburst of rejoicing. A satirist of the time declared that " the 
people had shed too many tears during his life to have any left 
for his death." 

454. The Court of Louis XIV. — The court of the Grand Mon- 
arch was the most extravagantly magnificent that Europe has 
ever seen. Never since Nero spread his Golden House over the 
burnt district of Rome and ensconcing himself amid its luxurious 
appointments exclaimed, " Now I am housed as a man ought to 
be," had prince or king so ostentatiously lavished upon himself the 
wealth of an empire. Louis had half a dozen palaces, the most 
costly of which was that at Versailles. Here he created, in what 
was originally a desert, a beautiful miniature universe of which he 
was the center, the resplendent sun — he chose the sun as his 
emblem — around which all revolved and from which all received 
light and life. Upon the central building and its adjuncts he spent 
fabulous sums, — what would probably be equal to more than a 
hundred million dollars with us. Here were gathered the beauty, 
wit, and learning of France. The royal household numbered over 
fifteen thousand persons, all living in costly and luxurious idleness 
at the expense of the people. 

One element of this enormous family was the great lords of the 
old feudal aristocracy. Dispossessed of their ancient power and 
wealth, they were content now to fill a place in the royal house- 
hold, — to be the king's pensioners and the elegant embellishment 



4i6 



FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 



of his court. "A military staff on a furlough for a century or 
more, around a commander-in-chief who gives fashionable enter- 
tainments, is," says Taine, " the principle and summary of the 
habits of society under the ancient regime." 

As can easily be imagined, the court life of this period was shame- 
fully corrupt. Vice, however, was gilded. The most scandalous 
immoralities were made attractive by the glitter of 
superficial accomplishment and by exquisite suavity 




Fig. 77. — View of Versailles. (From a photograph) 



and polish of manner. But, notwithstanding its insincerity and 
immorality, the brilliancy of the court of Louis dazzled all Europe. 
The neighboring courts imitated its manners and emulated its 
extravagances. In all matters of taste and fashion France gave 
laws to the continent, and the French language became the court 
language of the civiUzed world. 

455. Literature under Louis XIV. — Although Louis himself 
was not much of a scholar, he gave a most liberal encouragement 
to men of letters, thereby making his reign the Augustan Age of 
French literature. In this patronage Louis was not unselfish. He 
honored and befriended poets and writers of every class, because 
thus he extended the reputation of his court. These writers, pen- 
sioners of his bounty, filled all Europe with praises of the great 
king, and thus made the most ample and grateful return to Louis 
for his favor and liberality. 



FRENCH LITERATURE 



417 



Almost every species of literature was cultivated by the French 
writers of this era, yet it was in the province of the drama 
that the most eminent names appeared. The three great names 
here are those of Corneille (i 606-1684), Racine (i 639-1 699), 
and Mohere (162 2-1 673). Corneille and Racine were writers 
of tragedy ; Moliere was a writer of comedy. Corneille is called 
the " Father of French Tragedy." ^* 

456. Relation of the Reign of Louis XIV to the Revolution of 
1789. — "If it be asked," says the historian Von Hoist, "who 
did the most towards the destruction of the ancient regime, the 
correct answer is, beyond all question, Louis XIV, its greatest 
representative." Louis discredited absolute monarchy by his 
shameful misuse of his unlimited power. His many wars and his 
extravagant expenditures on an idle and profligate court weighed 
France down with crushing and intolerable burdens. It was the 
vast mass of misery and suffering created by his acting on the 
monstrous doctrine that " the many are made for the use of one," 
that did much to prepare the minds and hearts of the French 
people for the great Revolution. 

457. Decline of the French Monarchy under Louis XV (1715- 
1774). — The supremacy of the House of Bourbon passed away 
forever with Louis XIV. In passing from the reign of the Grand 
Monarch to that of his successor, we pass from the strongest and 
outwardly most briUiant reign in French history to the weakest 
and most humiliating. Louis XV was a despot without possess- 
ing any of the possible virtues of a despot. During his reign the 
French nation made a swift descent towards the abyss of the 
Revolution of 1789. 

14 Among other world-renowned French writers, philosophers, prelates, and orators 
who adorned the age of Louis XIV were Descartes (1596-1650), the father of modern 
philosophy; Pascal (1623-1662), the prodigy in mathematics and the author of the 
i^^moxis Provincial Letters ; La Bruyere (1645-1696), noveUst and unrivaled depicter 
of character and manners ; Madame de Sevigne (1626-1696), the brilliant letter writer, 
whose correspondence forms to-day a prized portion of French Hterature and con- 
stitutes a treasure of information for the court historian; Bossuet (1627-1704), the 
eloquent court preacher and champion of divine-right kingship ; and F^nelon (1651- 
171 5), the distinguished prelate and author of The Adventures of Telemachus, a dis- 
guised satire on the reign of Louis XIV. 



4l8 FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV 

For the first eight years of the reign affairs were in the hands 
of the Duke of Orleans, who was regent during the king's minor- 
ity. He was a corrupt man, a man absolutely shameless in his 
vices. Probably Rome in the days of the worst Caesars witnessed 
nothing in the way of reckless and riotous living to surpass what 
France witnessed under what is known as the Regency. 

A celebrated episode of this period was the financial experi- 
ment of John Law, a Scotchman who had gained the ear of the 
regent. His system involved the creation of a bank and the for- 
mation of a gigantic trading association known as the Mississippi 
Company. The government lent its credit to the bank, and 
granted the company for settlement the territory of Louisiana, 
the vast indefinite region in North America opened up to French 
enterprise by the explorations of La Salle. France now went wild 
in a fever of speculation. Rumors were spread abroad of the dis- 
covery of mountains of gold and precious stones in the territories 
of the company. The shares of the association rose by leaps and 
bounds to fabulous prices. The end was soon reached. The 
inflated scheme, which was to make everybody " rich and happy," 
collapsed, spreading broadcast bankruptcy and financial ruin, and 
passed into history as "The Mississippi Bubble." 

In 1723 the prince's minority ended and he assumed the gov- 
ernment. The atmosphere in which he had been brought up had 
wholly corrupted a nature seemingly prone to evil. He was com- 
pletely under the influence of his mistresses, of whom the most 
notorious was Madame de Pompadour. The loves, the hates, and 
the caprices of this woman were for nineteen years a chief factor 
in the decision of the weightiest matters of war and of peace. 
The highest appointments in the army and the navy were dictated 
by her. For a long series of years she was practically the prime 
minister of France. 

The conditions surrounding the throne being of this nature, it 
is not surprising that under Louis XV the influence, power, and 
prestige of France sensibly declined. She took part, indeed, but 
usually with injury to her mihtary reputation, in all the wars of 
this period. The most important of these for France was the 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



419 



Seven Years' War (175 6-1 763), known in America as the French 
and Indian War, which resulted in the loss to France of Canada 
in the New World and of her Indian empire in the Old. 

Though thus shorn of her colonial possessions, France managed 
to hold in Europe the provinces won for her by the wars and 
diplomacy of Louis XIV, and even made some fresh acquisitions 
of territory along the Rhenish frontier, besides gaining the island 
of Corsica in the Mediterranean, the birthplace of one who was 
soon to have much to do in shaping the destinies of France. 

But, taken all together, the period was one of great national 
humiHation : the French fleet was almost driven from the sea ; the 
martial spirit of the nation visibly declined; and France, from 
being the foremost of the states of Europe, became the least 
among the great powers. 

Selections from the Sources. — Memoirs of the Duke of Saint-Simon 
(trans, by Bayle St. John). Nowhere else can be found so lively and enter- 
taining an account of life at court under Louis XIV and the Regency as 
here. For glimpses of other sides of the life of the times read the Letters 
of Madame de Sevigne, accessible in different editions. These delightful 
letters cover the last half of the seventeenth century. 

Secondary Works. — For a comprehensive view^ of this period there is 
nothing superior to The Age of Louis Jf//^and The Decline of the French 
Monarchy, — translations by Mary L. Booth of the corresponding parts of 
Henri Martin's Histoire de France. Wakeman, Europe, i^gS-iji^, chaps, vi, 
vii, and ix-xv. ^^^^(ZYLYH, A History of France,vo\.\\\. Hassall, The French 
People, chaps, xii-xiv ; and Louis XIV and the Zenith of the French Monarchy. 
Perkins, France under Mazarin, vol. iij France under the Regency ; and 
France under Louis XV. These are all scholarly works of marked merit. 
Williams, Madame de Pompadour. For the history of the French in 
America during the age of Louis XIV, the reader will have recourse 
to FiSKE, New England and New France, chap, iv ; and to Parkman, 
Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Parliament of Paris. 2. Colbert. 
3. The harrowing of the Palatinate by Louis. 4. New France under 
Louis XIV. 5. The Palace at Versailles. 6. Life at the court. 7. Moliere, 
8. The Mississippi Bubble, 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

THE STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 
(1603-1689) 

I. The First Two Stuarts 
Reign of James the First {1603—162^) 

458. James* Conception of Kingship. — With the end of the 
Tudor line (sec. 393), James VI of Scotland, son of Mary Stuart, 
came to the Enghsh throne as James I of England. The acces- 
sion of the House of Stuart brought England and Scotland under 
the same sovereignty, though each country stiU retained its own 
legislature. 

James, like the other Stuarts who followed him on the English 
throne, was a firm believer in the doctrine of the di\dne right of 
kings. He held that hereditary princes are the Lord's anointed, 
and that their authority can in no way be questioned or limited 
by people, priest, or Parhament. These are his own words : " It 
is atheism and blasphemy to dispute what God can do : good 
Christians content themselves with His will revealed in His word ; 
so it is presumption and high contempt in a subject to dispute 
what a king can do, or say that a king cannot do this or that." -^ 

A strong support for this Stuart conception of the unlimited 
authority of kings was found in French theory and practice. The 
Stuarts were related to the French family of the Guises. They were 
in sympathy ^vith French modes of thought. Further, Charles I had 
for wife a French princess, Henrietta Maria. These affiliations 
with France naturally brought the Stuarts under French influence. 
They imitated the Bourbons. They quoted them constantly, and 

1 From the king's speech in the Star Chamber, 1616. 
420 



THE GUNPOWDER PLOT 



421 



Strove to make the government of England like that of France, 
an absolute monarchy.^ 

But the Commons of the English Parliament, and probably 
the majority of the EngHsh people, differed with their Stuart 
kings in their views concerning the nature of government, and 
particularly concerning the nature of the English government. 
In this difference of views lay hidden, as we shall learn, the germs 
of the Civil War and of all that grew out of it, — the Common- 
wealth, the Protectorate, and the Revolution of 1689. 

459. The Gunpowder Plot (1605). — In the second year of 
James' reign was unearthed an extraordinary plot to blow up 
with gunpowder the Parliament building, upon the opening day 
of the session of the Houses, when king. Lords, and Commons 
would all be present, and thus to destroy at a single blow every 
branch of the government. 

This conspiracy, known as the Gunpowder Plot, was entered 
into by some Catholics because they were disappointed in the 
course which the king and the Parliament had taken as regards 
their rehgion.^ The leader of the conspiracy, Guy Fawkes, was 
arrested, and after being put to the rack was executed. His chief 
accomplices were also seized and punished. The alarm created 
by the terrible plot led Parhament to enact some very severe laws 
against the Catholics. 

460. Contest between James and the Commons ; " the Sovereign 
King and the Sovereign People." — It has been seen what ideas 
James entertained of the kingly office. Such a view of royal 
authority and privileges was sure to bring him into conflict with 
Parliament, especially with the House of Commons. He was con- 
stantly dissolving Parliament and sending the members home, 
because they insisted upon considering subjects which he had told 
them they should let alone. 

An incident vividly lights up the situation. A committee from 
the Commons was about to wait upon the king. " Place twelve 

2 For the popular superstition of the « Royal Touch " and its bearing upon the 
matter discussed in this section, see Lecky, A History of England in the Eighteenth 
Century, vol. i, chap, i. 

3 Though son of the Catholic Mary Stuart, James had been educated as a Protestant. 



422 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

armchairs," said James to his attendants ; "I am going to receive 
twelve kings." What the king said in bitter irony was the simple 
truth. James, when he met the committee from the Commons, 
met men who were as sure that they had a divine right to rule 
England as he was that he had a divine commission to that same 
end. As the historian Guizot tersely expresses it, " Both king and 
people thought as sovereigns." Here were the conditions of an 
irrepressible conflict. 

The chief matters of dispute between the king and the Com- 
mons were the limits of the authority of the former in matters 
touching legislation and taxation, and the nature and extent of the 
privileges and jurisdiction of the latter. 

As to the limits of the royal powder, James talked and acted as 
though his prerogatives were practically unbounded. He issued 
proclamations which in their scope were really laws, and then 
enforced these royal edicts by fines and imprisonment as though 
they were regular statutes of Parliament. Moreover, taking advan- 
tage of some uncertainty in the law as regards the power of the 
king to collect customs at the ports of the realm, he laid new and 
unusual duties upon imports and exports. James' judges were 
servile enough to sustain him in this course, some of them going 
so far as to say in effect that " the seaports are the king's gates, 
which he may open and shut to whom he pleases." 

As to the privileges of the Commons, that body insisted, among 
other things, upon their right to determine all cases of contested 
election of their members, and to debate freely all questions con- 
cerning the common weal, without being liable to prosecution or 
imprisonment for words spoken in the House. James denied that 
these privileges were matters of right pertaining to the Commons, 
and repeatedly intimated to them that it was only through his 
own gracious permission and the favor of his ancestors that they 
were allowed to exercise these liberties at all, and that if their 
conduct was not more circumspect and reverential he should take 
away their privileges entirely. 

On one occasion, the Commons having ventured in debate upon 
certain- matters of state which the king had forbidden them to 



COLONIES AND TRADE SETTLEMENTS 423 

meddle with, he, in reproving them, made a more express denial 
than ever of their rights and privileges, which caused them, in a 
burst of noble indigilation, to spread upon their journal a brave 
protest, known as "The Great Protestation," which declared that 
"the liberties, franchises, privileges, and jurisdictions of Parliament 
are the ancient and undoubted birthright and inheritance of the 
subjects of England, and that the arduous and urgent affairs con- 
cerning the king, state, and defense of the realm and the Church 
of England . . . are proper subjects and matter of council and 
debate in Parliament" (162 1). 

When intelligence of this action was carried to the king, he 
angrily adjourned Parliament, sent for the journal of the House, 
and with his own hands struck out the obnoxious resolution. 
Then he dissolved Parliament, and even went so far as to imprison 
several of the members of the Commons. In these high-handed 
measures we get a glimpse of the Stuart theory of government, 
and see the way paved for the final break between king and 
people in the following reign. 

461. Colonies and Trade Settlements. — The reign of James I 
is signalized by the commencement of that system of colonization 
which has resulted in the establishment of the English race in 
almost every quarter of the globe. In the year 1607 Jamestown, 
so named in honor of the king, was founded in Virginia. This 
was the first permanent English settlement within the limits of 
the United States. In 1620 some Separatists, or Pilgrims, who 
had found in Holland a temporary refuge from persecution, pushed 
across the Atlantic, and amidst heroic sufferings and unparalleled 
hardships established the first settlement in New England and laid 
the foundations of civil liberty in the New World. 

Besides planting these settlements in the New World, the Eng- 
lish during this same reign estabhshed themselves in the ancient 
land of India. In 1 6 1 3 the East India Company established their 
first factory at Surat. This was the humble beginning of the gigan- 
tic Enghsh Empire in the East. 

In this connection must also be noticed the Plantation of Ulster 
in Ireland. The northern part of that island having been desolated 



424 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

by the Tyrone Rebellion (sec. 391), and large tracts of land 
having been forfeited to the EngHsh crown, this land was now 
given by royal grant to Enghsh and Scotch settlers. Some of the 
Celtic clans were removed bodily, and assigned lands in other 
parts of the island. This movement began in 1610. Its aim was 
to Protestantize and Anglicize the country. The end sought was 
in a good measure attained. In less than a century after the 
beginning of the colonization movement there were over a million 
Protestants of the Presbyterian sect settled in Ulster. The injustice 
and harshness of the treatment of the Irish natives awakened 
among them a spirit of bitter hostility to the newcomers, which, 
intensified by fresh wrongs, has imbittered all the relations of 
Ireland and England up to our own day. 

462. Literature. — One of the most noteworthy literary labors 
of the reign under review was a new translation of the Bible, known 
as King James' Version, published in 161 1. This version is the 
one in general use in the Protestant Church at the present day. 

The most noted writers of James' reign were a bequest to it 
from the brilliant era of Elizabeth.* Sir Walter Raleigh, the 
petted courtier of Elizabeth, fell on evil days after her death. 
On the chaige of taking part in a conspiracy against the crown, 
he was sent to the Tower, where he was kept a prisoner for thir- 
teen years. From the tedium of his long confinement he found 
relief in the composition of a History of the World. He was at 
last beheaded (16 18). 

The close of the life of the great philosopher Francis Bacon 
was scarcely less sad than that of Sir Walter Raleigh. He held 
the office of Lord Chancellor, and, yielding to the temptations of 
the corrupt times upon which he had fallen, accepted fees from the 
suitors who brought cases before him. He was impeached and 
brought to the bar of the House of Lords, where he confessed his 
fault, but asserted that the money he took never influenced his 
judgment. He appealed pathetically to his judges " to be merciful 

4 Shakespeare died about the middle of the reign (in 1616). Several of his com- 
panion dramatists, who like himself began their career under Elizabeth, also outlived 
the queen, and did most of their work during the reign of her successor. 



THE PETITION OF RIGHT 



425 



to a broken reed." He was sentenced to pay a heavy fine and 
to imprisonment in the Tower. But the king in pity released him 
from all the penalty and even conferred a pension upon him. He 
lived only five years after his fall and disgrace, dying in 1626. 

Bacon must be given the first place among the philosophers of 
the English-speaking race. His system is known as the " Inductive 
Method of Philosophy." It insists upon experiment and a careful 
observation of facts as the only true means of arriving at a knowl- 
edge of the laws«of nature. 

Reign of Charles the First (^162^—1640) 

463. The Petition of Right (1628). — Charles I came to the 
throne with all his father's lofty notions about the divine right of 
kings. He made his own these words of Scripture : " Where the 
word of a king is, there is power : and who may say unto him. 
What doest thou? " ^ Consequently the old contest between king 
and Parliament was straightway renewed. The first two Parlia- 
ments of his reign Charles dissolved speedily, because instead of 
voting supplies they persisted in investigating public grievances. 

After the dissolution of his second Parliament, Charles endeav- 
ored to raise by means of benevolences (sec. 361) and forced 
loans the money he needed to carry on the government. But all 
his expedients failed to meet his needs, and he was forced to fall 
back upon Parliament. The Houses met, and promised to grant him 
generous subsidies, provided he would approve a certain Petition 
of Right which they had drawn up. Next after Magna Carta, 
this document is the most important in the constitutional history 
of England. Four abuses were provided against: (i) the raising 
of money by loans, benevolences, taxes, etc., without the consent 
of Parliament ; (2) imprisonment without cause shown ; (3) the 
quartering of soldiers in private houses, — a very vexatious thing ; 
and (4) trial by martial law, that is, without jury. 

Charles was as reluctant to assent to the petition as King John 
was to assent to Magna Carta; but he was at length forced to 

6 Ecclesiastes viii 4 ; cited by Charles on his trial in 1649, 



426 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

give sanction to it by the use of the usual formula, " Let it be law 

as desired " (1628). 

464. Charles rules without Parliament (162 9-1 640). — It soon 

became evident that Charles was utterly insincere when he gave 

his assent to the Petition of Right. He immediately violated 

its provisions in attempting to raise 
money by forbidden taxes and loans. 
For eleven years he ruled without 
Parliament, thus changing the govern- 
ment of England from a government 
by king, Lords, and Commons to what 
was in effect an absolute and irrespon- 
sible monarchy, like that of France 
or of Spain. 

Prominent among Charles' most ac- 
tive agents were his ministers, Thomas 
Wentworth, later Earl of Strafford, and 
William Laud, Bishop of London and 
later Archbishop of Canterbury, both 
of whom earned unenviable reputa- 
tions through their industry and 
success in building up the absolute 
power of their master upon the ruins 
of the ancient institutions of English 
liberty. 

The high-handed and tyrannical 
proceedings of Charles and his agents 
were enforced by three iniquitous 

Fig. 78— Charles L (After ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ arbitrary juris- 
a painting by Vandyke) -, . . rr^, 1 , 

diction. These were known as the 

"Council of the North," the "Star Chamber," and the "High 

Commission Court." ^ All of these courts sat without jury, and 




6 The first ■was a tribunal established by Henry VIII, and now employed by Went- 
worth as an instrument for enforcing the king's despotic authority in the turbulent 
northern counties of England. The Star Chamber was a court organized by Henry 
VII, which at this time dealt chiefly with criminal cases affecting the government, 



JOHN HAMPDEN AND SHIP MONEY 427 

being composed of the creatures of the king, were of course his 
subservient instruments. Often their decisions were unjust and 
arbitrary, their punishments harsh and cruel. 

465. John Hampden and Ship Money (1637-1638). — Among 
the illegal taxes levied during this period of tyranny was a species 
known as "ship money," so called from the fact that in early 
times the kings, when the realm was in danger, called upon the 
seaports and maritime counties to contribute ships and ship 
material for the public service. Charles and his agents, in look- 
ing this matter over, conceived the idea of extending t^is tax 
over the inland as well as the seaboard counties. 

Among those who refused to pay the tax was a country gentle- 
man named John Hampden. The case was tried in the Court of 
Exchequer, before all the twelve judges. All England watched the 
progress of the suit with the utmost solicitude. The question was 
argued by able counsel both on the side of Hampden and of the 
crown. Judgment was finally rendered in favor of.the king, al- 
though five of the twelve judges stood for Hampden. The case 
was lost ; but the people, who had been following the arguments, 
were fully persuaded that it went against Hampden simply for the 
reason that the judges stood in fear of the royal displeasure should 
they dare to decide the case adversely to the crown. 

The arbitrary and despotic character which the government 
had now assumed in both civil and religious matters, and the 
hopelessness of relief or protection from the courts, caused thou- 
sands to seek in the New World that freedom and security 
which was denied them in their own land. 

466. The Bishops' War (1639). — England was ready to rise 
in open revolt against the unbearable tyranny. Events in Scot- 
land hastened the crisis. The king was attempting to impose the 
English liturgy (slightly modified) upon the Scotch Presbyterians. 
A Sabbath was set on which the Hturgy should be introduced 
in all the churches. To the Scotch this seemed little short of a 

such as riot, libel, and conspiracy. The High Commission Court was a tribunal of 
forty-four commissioners, created in Elizabeth's reign to enforce the Acts of Suprem- 
acy and Uniformity. 



428 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

restoration of the " Popery " they had renounced. Tradition tells 
how at Edinburgh the attempt of the bishop to read the serv- 
ice led to a riot, one of the worshipers, Janet Geddes by name, 
flinging her stool at the bishop's head.'^ The spirit of resistance 
spread. All classes, nobles and peasants alike, bound themselves 
by a solemn covenant to resist to the very last every attempt to 
make innovations in their religion. 

The king resolved to crush the movement by force. The 
Scotch accepted the challenge with all that ardor which religious 
enthusiasm never fails to inspire. Charles soon found that war 
could not be carried on without money, and was constrained to 
summon Parliament in hopes of obtaining a vote of supplies. 
But instead of making the king a grant of money, the Commons 
first gave their attention to the matter of grievances, whereupon 
Charles dissolved the Parliament. The Scottish forces crossed 
the border, and the king, helpless, with an empty treasury and a 
seditious army, was forced again to summon the two Houses. 

467. The Long Parliament. — Under this call met on Nov. 3, 
1640, the Parhament which, from the circumstance of its sitting 
for twelve years, and legally existing for nearly twenty, became 
known as the " Long Parhament." A small majority of the 
members of the Commons of this Parliament were stern and 
determined men, men who fully realized the danger in which the 
traditional liberties of Englishmen were set, and who were resolved 
to put a check to the despotic course of the king. 

Almost the first act of the Commons was the impeachment of 
Strafford, as the most prominent instrument of the king's tyranny 
and usurpation. He was finally condemned by a bill of attainder ^ 
and sent to the block. 

To secure themselves against dissolution before their work was 
done, the Houses passed a bill which provided that they should 
not be adjourned or dissolved without their own consent. The 

T' The " flight of Jenny's stool " holds some such place in the story of the English 
Revolution as the throwing of the tea into Boston harbor holds in the story of the 
American Revolution. 

8 See sec. 375, n. 5. Laud was executed in 1645. 



THE INSURRECTION IN IRELAND 



429 



three arbitrary courts of which we have spoken, the High Com- 
mission Court, the Council of the North, and the Star Chamber, 
were abolished. Finally, an act was passed declaring the illegality 
of ship money and annulling the judgment against John Hampden 
"as contrary to and against the laws and statutes of this realm." 




Fig. 79. — Execution of the Earl of Strafford. (From a 
contemporary print) 

468. The Insurrection in Ireland (1641). — -The situation was 
critical ; it was rendered still more so by an uprising in Ireland.® 
Taking advantage of the quarrel between Charles and his Parlia- 
ment, the Irish Catholics rose in revolt. The aim of the insur- 
rection was to wipe out the colony planted in the reign of James I 
(sec. 461), and to bring to an end Protestant ascendancy in 
Ireland. Von Ranke characterizes the insurrection as one of the 



9 It was just after the outbreak of the revolt that the Commons drew up and pub- 
lished what is known as " The Grand Remonstrance." For the text of this important 
document and the accompanying petition, see Gardiner's Constitutional Documents 
of the Puritan Revolution^ vol. ii, pp. 203-232. 



430 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

most cruel of which we have record. It was cruel because the 
native Irish were stirred not only by deep race enmity but also 
by bitter religious hatred. Neither age nor sex was spared. Thou- 
sands of the English and Scotch settlers perished miserably. If 
was not long before an EngHsh Protestant army made savage 
reprisals (sec. 478). 

469. Charles* Attempt to seize the Five Members. — An impru- 
dent act on the part of Charles now precipitated the nation into 
the gulf of civil war, towards which events had been so rapidly 
drifting. With the design of overawing the Commons, the king 
made a charge of treason against five of the leading members, 
among whom were Hampden and Pym, and sent officers to effect 
their arrest; but the accused were not to be found. The next 
day Charles himseK, accompanied by armed attendants, went to 
the House for the purpose of seizing the five members; but, 
having been forewarned of the king's intention, they had with- 
drawn from the hall. The king was not long in reaHzing the state 
of affairs, and with the observation, " I see the birds have flown," 
withdrew from the chamber. 

Charles had taken a fatal step. The nation could not forgive 
the insult offered to its representatives. . All London rose in arms. 
The king, frightened by the storm which his rashness had raised, 
fled from the city to York. From the flight of Charles from Lon- 
don may be dated the beginning of the civil war (Jan. 10, 1642). 



The Civil War (1642-1640) 

470. The Two Parties. — The country was now divided into 
two great parties. Those that enlisted under the king's standard 
— on whose side rallied, for the most part, the nobiHty, the gen- 
try, and the clergy — were known as Royalists or Cavaliers ; 
while those that gathered about the Parhamentary banner, the 
townsmen and the yeomanry, were called Parliamentarians or 
Roundheads, the latter term being apphed to them because many 
of their number cropped their hair close to the head, simply for 
the reason that the Cavaliers affected long and flowing locks. 



OLIVER CROMWELL AND HIS "IRONSIDES" 431 

The most noted leader of the Royahsts was the king's nephew, 
Prince Rupert, a dashing cavalry officer ; the commander of the 
Parliamentary forces was the Earl of Essex. The Cavaliers favored 
the Established Episcopal Church, while the Roundheads were 
Puritans. During the progress of the struggle the Presbyterians 
and Independents (later CongregationaHsts) became the leading 
factions in the Puritan party. 

471. Oliver Cromwell and his "Ironsides." — The war had 
continued about three years -^^ when there came into prominence 
among the officers of the Parliamentary forces a man of destiny, 
one of the great characters of history, — Oliver Cromwell. Dur- 
ing the early campaigns of the war, as colonel of a troop of 
cavalry, he had exhibited his rare genius as an organizer and 
disciplinarian. His regiment became famous under the name of 
"Cromwell's Ironsides." It was composed entirely of "men of 
religion." Swearing, drinking, and the usual vices of the camp 
were unknown among them. They advanced to the charge with 
the singing of psalms. During all the war the regiment was never 
once beaten. 

472. The "Self-Denying Ordinance" and the "New Model" 
(1645). — The military operations of these earlier years of the 
war had revealed fatal defects in the Parliamentary army. It was 
composed of local bands, was irregularly paid, and was in large 
part officered by persons who had received their commissions 
because of their social rank. The soldiers were mutinous, and 
in the opinion of one of their officers, who wrote the Commons 
about their conduct, were " fit only for a gallows here and a hell 
hereafter." Such an army could never beat the Royahsts. 

The leaders in the Commons got rid of the titled inefficients 
by means of a measure known as the " Self-Denying Ordinance," 
which required that members of either House holding commands 
in the army should resign within forty days. At the same time 
they created a new army of twenty-one thousand men, called the 

10 The first skirmish of the war was at Edgehill (1642), but the most important 
engagement of these earlier years was the battle of Marston Moor (1644), in which 
the Royalists suffered a severe defeat. 



432 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

" New ModeL" It differed from the earlier Parliamentary force 
as a regular army differs from militia. Sir Thomas Fairfax was 
created commander-in-chief, and Cromwell was made lieutenant- 
general, which gave him command of the horse. -^^ 

Religious opinions had not been made a test for admission to 
the new army; but as a matter of fact its officers were for the 
most part Independents, and in the course of time the army 
through their influence became such a body of religious enthusi- 
asts as the world had not seen since Godfrey led his crusaders to 
the rescue of the Holy Sepulcher. A great part of the men were 
fervent. God-fearing, psalm-singing Puritans. When not fighting, 
they studied the Bible, prayed, and sang hymns. 

473. The Battle of Naseby (1645). — The temper of the " New 
Model" was soon tried in the battle of Naseby, the decisive 
engagement of the war. The Royalists were beaten and their 
cause was irretrievably lost. Charles escaped from the field, and 
ultimately fled into Scotland, thinking that he might rely upon the 
loyalty of the Scots to the House of Stuart ; but on his refusing 
to sign the Covenant and certain other articles, they gave him up 
to the En^ish Parliament. 

474. " Pride's Purge " (1648). — Now, there were many in the 
Parliament who were in favor of restoring the king to his throne 
on the basis of conditions which he himself had proposed, that is 
to say, without requiring from him any sufficient guaranties that 
he would in the future rule in accordance with the constitution 
and the laws of the land. The Independents, that is to say Crom- 
well and the army, saw in this possibility the threatened ruin of 
all their hopes and the loss of all the fruits of victory. A high- 
handed measure was resolved upon, — the exclusion from the 
House of Commons of all those members who favored the res- 
toration of Charles. 

Accordingly an officer by the name of Pride was stationed at 
the door of the hall to exclude or to arrest the members obnoxious 

11 There were two self-denying ordinances ; the second, unlike the first, did not 
permanently disqualify for office. Cromwell, like the others concerned, gave up his 
post, but was almost immediately reappointed. 



TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF THE KING 433 

to the army. One hundred and forty-three members were thus 
kept from their seats, and the Commons became reduced to about 
fifty representatives. This performance -was appropriately called 
" Pride's Purge." " The minority had now become the majority." 
But that is not an approved way of creating a majority. 

475. Trial and Execution of the King (Jan. 30, 1649). — The 
Commons thus "purged" of the king's friends now passed a 
resolution for the immediate trial of Charles for treason. A High 




Fig. 80. — Westminster Hall. (From a photograph) 

This ancient hall was the scene of the trial and condemnation of Charles I. It 
had previously witnessed the condemnation to death of many celebrated per- 
sons, among whom were WilHam Wallace, Sir Thomas More, and the Earl 
of Strafford. 

Court of Justice, comprising one hundred and thirty-five members, 
was organized, before which Charles was summoned. Appearing 
before the court, he denied its authority to try him, consistently 
maintaining that no earthly tribunal could rightly question his acts. 
But the trial went on, and before the close of a week he was con- 
demned to be executed " as a tyrant, traitor, murderer, and public 
enemy to the good people of this nation." 

In a few days the sentence was carried out. Charles bore him- 
self in the presence of death with great composure and dignity. 



434 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

On the scaffold he spoke these words, the sincerity of which can- 
not be doubted : " For the people truly I desire their liberty and 
freedom as much as anybody whatsoever ; but I must tell you that 
their liberty and freedom consists in having government ; ... it 
is not in their having a share in the government ; that is nothing 
pertaining to them." 

II. The Commonwealth and the Protectorate 
(i 649-1 660) 

476. Establishment of the Commonwealth. — A few weeks after 
the execution of Charles, the Commons voted to abolish the office 
of king as ''unnecessary, burdensome, and dangerous to the liberty, 
safety, and public interest of the people," and also to do away with 
the House of Lords as likewise "useless and dangerous to the 
people of England," and to establish a free state under the name 
of "The Commonwealth." A new Great Seal was made with this 
legend and date : " In the first year of freedom, by God's blessing 
restored, 1648." ^^ The executive power was lodged in a Council 
of State, composed of forty-one persons. Of this body the eminent 
patriot Sir Henry Vane was the leading member. 

477. Troubles of the Commonwealth. — The republic thus born 
of mingled religious and poUtical enthusiasm was beset with dan- 
gers from the very first. The execution of Charles had alarmed 
every sovereign in Europe. Russia, France, and the Dutch Repub- 
lic -^^ all refused to have any communication with the ambassadors 
of the Commonwealth. The Scots, who too late repented of 
having surrendered their sovereign into the hands of his enemies, 
now hastened to 'wipe out the stain of their disloyalty by pro- 
claiming his son their king, with the title of Charles the Second. 
The Royalists in Ireland declared for the prince ; while the Dutch 
began active preparations to assist him in regaining the throne 



12 According to the method of reckoning then in vogue, the year 1648 did not end 
until March 24. 

13 William II, the Stadtholder of all the Dutch provinces except Friesland, was 
the son-in-law of Charles I. 



WAR WITH IRELAND 



435 



of his unfortunate father. In England itseK the Royalists were 
active and threatening. 

478. War with Ireland (1649-165 2). — The Commonwealth, 
like the ancient republic of Rome, seemed to gather strength 
and energy from the very multitude of surrounding dangers. 
Cromwell was made Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and sent into 
that country to crush the Royahst party there. With his " Iron- 
sides " he made quick and terrible work of the suppression of the 
Catholic Royalists. Having taken by storm the town of Drogheda, 
which had refused his summons to surrender, he massacred the 
entire garrison, consisting of three thousand men (1649). About 
a thousand who had sought asylum in a church were butchered 
there without mercy. The capture of other towns was accompanied 
by massacres little less terrible. The following is his own account 
of the manner in which he dealt with the captured garrisons : 
" When they submitted, their officers were knocked on the head, 
and every tenth man of the soldiers killed, and the rest shipped 
for Barbadoes.". Cromwell's savage cruelty in his dealings with the 
Irish is an indelible stain on his memory. 

The Catholic Royalists having been defeated, the best lands 
of the island were confiscated and granted to English and Scotch 
settlers, after the manner of the colonization of Protestant immi- 
grants in Ulster in the reign of James I (sec. 461). This method 
of securing Protestant ascendancy in the island is what English 
history designates as the " Cromwellian settlement," but which 
Irish resentment calls the "Curse of Cromwell." The religious 
ferocity of this Puritan settlement of Ireland fanned fiercely the 
flame of hatred which earlier wrongs had kindled in the hearts 
of the Irish people against their English conquerors, — a flame 
which has not yet burned itself out.^* 

479. War with Scotland (1650-165 1). — Cromwell was called 
out of Ireland by the Council to lead an army into Scotland. 

14 Between the years 1641 and 1652 over half a million inhabitants of the island 
were destroyed or banished; Prendergast {Cromwelhan Settlement, p. 177) affirms 
that during these years and those immediately following five sixths of the population 
perished. " A man might travel," he says, " for twenty or thirty miles and not see a 
living creature." 



436 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

The terror of his name went before him, and the people fled as 
he approached. At Dunbar he met the Scottish army. Before 
the terrible onset of the fanatic Roundheads the Scots were scat- 
tered like chaif before the wind. Ten thousand were made pris- 
oners, and all the camp train and artillery were captured (1650). 

The following year, on the anniversary of the battle of Dunbar, 
Cromwell gained another great victory over the Scottish army at 
Worcester, and all Scotland was soon after forced to submit to the 
authority of the Commonwealth. Prince Charles, after many ad- 
venturous experiences, escaped across the Channel into Normandy. 

480. War with the Dutch (165 2-1 654). — With the authority 
of the Commonwealth acknowledged throughout the British Isles, 
the Parliament sought to increase the power and influence of the 
republic and to benefit English commerce by an alliance with 
the Dutch ; but since such a confederation as that proposed 
would have made the Netherlands little more than a province 
of the Enghsh Commonwealth, the Dutch refused, rather con- 
temptuously, to enter into the arrangement. The Enghsh Par- 
liament thereupon passed a measure known as the Navigation 
Act (165 1), which forbade foreign ships to bring into England 
any products or manufactures save those of their own country. 
This was a blow aimed at the Dutch, whose ships brought to the 
Enghsh docks the products of every land on the globe, including 
the English colonies in America. 

In the war which ensued the English found a worthy foe in 
the stout Dutch sailors. That they were able to wage war with 
them on anything like equal terms was due largely to the fore- 
sight and energy of Sir Henry Vane, who was the real head of 
the English government from 1649 to 1653, and who in the 
carrying out of his policy to build up the navy as a counter- 
poise to the army, which was overshadowing the civil authority 
and threatening the establishment of a military dictatorship, had 
greatly developed and strengthened the sea power of England. 
After the rival fleets had inflicted great injury and loss upon 
each other in many a stubborn sea fight, the two republics were 
reconciled (1654). 



THE "LITTLE PARLIAMENT" 437 

481. Cromwell ejects the Long Parliament (1653). — While 
the Dutch war was going on, the Parliament that provoked it 
had come to an open quarrel with the army. Cromwell demanded 
of Parliament their dissolution and the calling of a new body. 
This they refused; whereupon, taking with him a body of sol- 
diers, Cromwell went to the House, and after listening impa- 
tiently for a while to the debate, suddenly sprang to his feet 
and with bitter reproaches exclaimed : "I will put an end to 
your prating. Get you gone; give place to better men. You 
are no Parliament. The Lord has done with you." At a pre- 
arranged signal his soldiers rushed in. The hall was cleared. 
Picking up the speaker's mace, Cromwell contemptuously asked, 
"What shall be done with his bauble?" "Take it away," he 
ordered. Then the soldiers withdrew from the hall and the door 
was locked. 

In such summary manner the Long Parliament, or the " Rump 
Parliament," as it was called in derision after " Pride's Purge," was 
dissolved, after having sat for twelve years. So completely had 
the body lost the confidence and respect of all parties that scarcely 
a murmur was heard against the illegal and arbitrary mode of its 
dissolution. 

482. The "Little Parliament" and the Establishment of the 
Protectorate (1653). — Cromwell now called together a new Par- 
liament or more properly a convention, summoning, so far as he 
might, only religious. God-fearing men. The " Little Parliament," 
as sometimes called, consisted of one hundred and fifty-six mem- 
bers, mainly rehgious zealots, who spent much of their time in 
Scripture exegesis, prayer, and exhortation. Among them was a 
London leather merchant, named Praise-God Barebone, who was 
especially given to these exercises. The name amused the people, 
and as the exhorter was a fair representative of a considerable 
section of the convention, they nicknamed it " Barebone's Parlia- 
ment," by which designation it has passed into history. 

The " Little Parliament " sat only five months, and then, resign- 
ing all its authority into the hands of Cromwell, dissolved itself. 
A sort of constitution, called the " Instrument of Government," 



438 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 



was now drawn up by a council of army officers and approved 
by CromwelL This instrument, the first of written constitutions, 
provided for a Parliament consisting of a single House, a Council 
of State, and an executive or president serving for life and bearing 
the title of " Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, 

Scotland, and Ire- 
land." Under this 
instrument Cromwell 
became Lord Pro- 
tector for life. 

483. The Protect- 
orate (1653- 1659). 
— Cromwell's power 
was now almost un- 
limited. He was vir- 
tually a dictator, for 
he had the power of 
the army behind 
him. The Protector 
summoned, win- 
nowed, and dissolved 
Parliament at pleas- 
ure. He could get 
together no body of 
men who could or 
would work smoothly 
with him. "The 
Lord judge between 
me and you," were 
his words of dismissal 




Fig. 81. — Oliver Cromwell. (Taken at the 
age of fifty-eight years. From an enlargement 
in oil of the head drawn in water colors by 
Samuel Cooper, now the property of the Duke 
of Buccleuch) 



to his last unmanageable and obstinate Parliament. 

For five years Cromwell carried on the government practically 
alone. His rule was arbitrary but enlightened. He gave England 
the strongest government she had had since the days of Wolsey 
and of Elizabeth, a government which, while securing obedience 
and prosperity at home, won the fear and respect of foreign 



THE PROTECTORATE 439 

powers, so that Cromwell addressing Parliament could truthfully 
declare, " I dare say that there is not a nation in Europe but is 
willing to ask a good understanding with you." 

Cromwell's aim was " to make England great and to make her 
worthy of greatness." This worthiness he, zealous Puritan as he 
was, conceived could be acquired by England only as her affairs 
were conducted by godly men and in accord with the plain precepts 
of Scripture. 

Further, in Oliver's mind, the English nation could be God's 
own people and worthy of greatness only as England upheld the 
Protestant cause in Europe. It was this religious persuasion 
which led him to become the protector of Protestantism wherever 
imperiled. He interposed successfully in behalf of the Huguenots 
in France, and secured for them a respite from harassment; he 
obliged the Duke of Savoy to cease his cruel persecution of the 
Vaudois ; and caused the Pope to be informed that if the Protes- 
tants continued to be molested anywhere — Cromwell laid the 
blame of everything done against Protestant interests at the door 
of the Papacy — the roar of English guns would speedily awaken 
the echoes of St. Angelo. 

It was with the double aim of making England great on the 
sea and of crippling the champion of Catholicism that Cromwell 
entered into an alliance with France against Spain. During a 
great part of his rule the Protector was fighting this old-time foe 
of England and of Protestantism. He captured her treasure ships 
within sight of the ports of the peninsula, wrested from her the 
island of Jamaica in the West Indies, and secured the cession of 
the important seaport of Dunkirk on the Straits of Dover. 

484. Cromwell's Death. — Notwithstanding Cromwell was a 
man of immovable resolution and iron spirit, still he felt sorely 
the burdens of his government, and was deeply troubled by the 
anxieties of his position. In the midst of apparent success he was 
painfully conscious of utter failure. He had wished to establish a 
permanent government by "a single person" and Parliament, 
with himself as the recognized constitutional head of the state. 
Instead, he found himself a military usurper, whose title was simply 



440 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

the title of the sword. His government, we may believe, was as 
hateful to himself as to the great mass of the English people. He 
lived in constant fear of the dagger. With his constitution under- 
mined by overwork and anxiety, fever attacked him, and with 
gloomy apprehensions as to the terrible dangers into which Eng- 
land might drift after his hand had fallen from the helm of affairs, 
he lay down to die, passing away on the day which he had always 
called his "fortunate day " — the anniversary of his great victories 
of Dunbar and Worcester (Sept. 3, 1658). 

As when the great Napoleon lay dying at St. Helena the island 
was shaken by a fierce tempest, so now the elements seemed to 
be in sympathy with the restless soul of Cromwell. "A storm 
which tore roofs from houses and leveled huge trees in every forest 
seemed a fitting prelude to the passing away of his mighty spirit." 
But the enemies of the Protector believed that the tempest was 
raised by the devil, who had come for Oliver's soul. 

485 . Richard Cromwell (165 8- 165 9). — Cromwell with his dying 
breath — so it was given out — had designated his son Richard as 
his successor in the office of the Protectorate. Richard was exacdy 
the opposite of his father, — timid, irresolute, and irreligious. The 
control of affairs that had taxed to the utmost the genius and 
resources of the father was altogether too great an undertaking for 
the incapacity and inexperience of the son. No one was quicker to 
realize this than Richard himself, and after a rule of a few months, 
yielding to the pressure of the army, whose displeasure he had 
incurred, he resigned his office. 

486. The Restoration (1660). — For some months after the fall 
of the Protectorate the country trembled on the verge of anarchy. 
The gloomy outlook into the future and the unsatisfactory experi- 
ment of the Commonwealth caused the great mass of the English 
people earnestly to desire the restoration of the monarchy, — in 
truth, the majority of the nation had never desired its aboHtiori. 
Charles Stuart, towards whom the tide of returning loyalty was 
running, was now in Holland. General Monk, the commander of 
the army in Scotland and the representative of Scottish sentiment, 
marched south to London and assumed virtual control of affairs. 



WHY THE PURITAN REVOLUTION FAILED 441 

The Long Parliament, including the members ejected by Pride 
(sec. 481), now reassembled, and by resolution declared that 
" according to the ancient and fundamental laws of this kingdom 
the government is and ought to be by king, Lords, and Com- 
mons." An invitation was sent to Prince Charles to return to his 
people and take his place upon the throne of his ancestors. 

Amid the wildest demonstrations of joy Charles stepped ashore 
on the island from which he had been for nine years an exile. As 
he observed the extensive preparations made for his reception, and 
received from all parties the warmest congratulations, he remarked 
with pleasant satire, " Surely it is my own fault that I have remained 
these years in exile from a country which is so glad to see me." 

487. Why the Puritan Revolution failed. — The Puritan Revolu- 
tion had failed. To assign the deeper causes of this failure, whether 
in circumstances or in the personal character of Cromwell or of 
other leaders of the movement, would be a difficult thing to do ; 
but without much hesitation we may say that one of the near-lying 

causes of the failure was that the Puritans committed the fault 

which has been declared to be almost always the fault of revolu- 
tionists—of going too fast and too far. At the outset the Revolu- 
tion had for its aim simply the setting of reasonable restrictions 
upon the exercise of the royal authority. Very soon, however, 
the kingly office, the hereditary House of Lords, and the Episco- 
pal Church had been abolished. Each of these extreme measures 
raised up many implacable enemies of the Revolution. 

Then again, Puritanism, in many things, had got far away from 
EngHsh good sense. The Puritan regulations respecting harmless 
amusements, the observance of the Sabbath, and a hundred other 
matters were extreme and absurd, and well calculated to provoke 
the scoff of the godless. So while in some directions the Puritans 
were merely in advance of the mass of the English people, in 
others they had gone far aside from the path that England was 
treading or was ever going to tread. Hence Puritanism was 
bound to fail. 

But to leave the matter thus would be misleading. In a 
deeper sense Puritanism did not fail. " What of heroism, what of 



442 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

eternal light," says Carlyle, " there be in a man and his life . . . 
remains forever a new divine portion of the sum of things." And 
so was it with Puritanism. What of heroism and of truth there 
was in it — and there was much of both — was added to the sum 
of English history. Much that is best and truest in the life of 
England to-day and of Greater England beyond the seas strikes 
its roots deep in the Puritanism of the seventeenth century. 

488. Puritan Literature ; it lights up the Religious Side of the 
English Revolution. — No epoch in history receives a fresher 
illustration from the study of its literature than that of the Puritan 
Revolution. To neglect this, and yet hope to gain a true concep- 
tion of that wonderful episode in the life of the English people 
by an examination of its outer events and incidents alone, would, 
as Green declares, be like trying to form. an idea of the life and 
work of ancient Israel from Kings and Chronicles, without 
Psalms and Prophets. The true character of the EngUsh Revolu- 
tion, especially upon its religious side, must be sought in the 
magnificent epic of Milton and the unequaled allegory of Bunyan. 

Both of these great works, it is true, were written after the 
Restoration, but they were both inspired by that spirit which had 
struck down despotism and set up the Commonwealth. The 
epic was the work of a lonely, disappointed republican ; the alle- 
gory, of a captive Puritan. 

Milton (1608-16 74) stands as the grandest representative of 
Puritanism. After the death of Charles I he wrote a famous work 
in Latin entitled The Defense of the English People, in which he 
justified the execution of the king. His Areopagitica or Speech 
for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing, written some years earlier, 
is an eloquent plea for freedom of opinion and of teaching. 

The Restoration forced Milton into retirement, and the last 
fourteen years of his life were passed apart from the world. It 
was during these years that, in loneliness and bHndness, he com- 
posed the immortal poems Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. 
The former is the " Epic of Puritanism." All that was truest and 
grandest in the Puritan character found expression in the moral 
elevation and religious fervor of this the greatest of Christian epics. 



THE RESTORED STUARTS 443 

John Bunyan (1628— 1688) was a Puritan nonconformist. 
After the Restoration he was imprisoned for twelve years in Bed- 
ford jail, on account of nonconformity to the established worship. 
It was during this dreary confinement that he wrote his PilgrinCs 
Progress, the most admirable allegory in English literature. The 
habit of the Puritan, from constant study of the Bible, to employ 
in all forms of discourse its language and imagery, is best illus- 
trated in the pages of this remarkable work. Here, as nowhere 
else, we learn what realities to the Puritan were the Bible repre- 
sentations of sin, repentance, and atonement, of heaven and hell. 



III. The Restored Stuarts 
Reign of Charles the Second (^1660— 1685) 

489. Punishment of the Regicides. — The monarchy having 
been restored in the person of Charles II, Parliament extended a 
general pardon to all who had taken part in the late rebellion, 
except Sir Henry Vane and certain of the judges who had con- 
demned Charles to the block. Thirteen of these were executed 
with revolting cruelty, their hearts and bowels being cut out of 
their living bodies. Others of the regicides were condemned to 
imprisonment for life. Vane was finally executed. Death had 
already removed the other great leaders of the rebellion, — Crom- 
well, Ireton, and Bradshaw, — beyond the reach of Royalist hate ; 
so vengeance was taken upon their bodies. These were dragged 
from their tombs in Westminster Abbey, hauled to Tyburn, and 
there on the anniversary of Charles' execution were hanged, and 
afterwards beheaded (1661). 

490. The Conventicle and Five-Mile Acts. — Early in the reign 
the services of the Anghcan Church were restored by Parliament;, 
and harsh laws were enacted against all nonconformists. The 
Conventicle Act (1664) made it a crime for five persons or more, 
"over and above those of the same household," to gather in any 
house or in any place for worship, unless the service was con- 
ducted according to the forms of the Church of England. 



444 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

The Five-Mile Act (1665) forbade any nonconformist minister 
who refused to swear that it is unlawful to take arms against the 
king under any circumstances, and that he never would attempt 
to make any change in Church or state government, to approach, 
" unless only in passing upon the road," within five miles of any 
city, corporate town, or borough sending members to Parliament, 
or of any place where he had once ministered. 

491. The Covenanters. — In Scotland the attempt to suppress 
conventicles and introduce Episcopacy was stoutly resisted by the 
Covenanters (sec. 466) who insisted on their right to worship God 
in their own way. They were therefore subjected to persecutions 
most cruel and unrelenting. They were hunted by Enghsh 
troopers over their native moors and among the wild recesses of 
their mountains, whither they secretly retired for prayer and wor- 
ship. The tales of the sufferings of the Scotch Covenanters at the 
hands of the English Protestants form a most harrowing chapter 
of the records of the ages of religious persecution. 

492 . The Dutch War, the Fire, and the Plague. — The years 
from 1664 to 1667 were crowded with calamities, — with war, 
plague, and fire. The poet Dryden not inaptly calls the year 
1666, in which the Great Fire at London added its horrors and 
losses to those of pestilence and war, the Annus Mirabilis, or 
"Year of Wonders." 

The war alluded to was a struggle between the EngHsh and the 
Dutch, which grew out of commercial rivalries (i 664-1 667). In 
the first year of this contest the English took New Amsterdam in 
America away from the Dutch, and changed its name to New 
York in honor of the king's brother, the Duke of York. In the 
year 1667 the Dutch fleet entered the estuary of the Thames, 
burned some English ships, and threatened London. This was 
the first time a hostile vessel had floated on that river since the 
days of the Vikings. The EngHsh felt deeply the humiliation. 
It was, writes a contemporary, John Evelyn, " a dreadful spectacle 
as ever Englishman saw, and a dishonor never to be wiped off." 

Early in the summer of 1665 London was swept by a woeful 
plague, the most terrible visitation the city had known since the 



CHARLES' INTRIGUES WITH LOUIS XIV 445 



Black Death in the Middle Ages (sec. 217). Within six months 
one hundred thousand of the population perished. 

The plague was followed the next year by a great fire, which 
destroyed over thirteen thousand houses, eighty-nine churches, 
and a vast number of public buildings. The disaster was a bless- 
ing in disguise. The burned districts were rebuilt in a more sub- 
stantial way, with broader streets and more airy residences, so 
that London became a more beautiful and healthful city than 
would have been possible without the fire.^^ 

493. Charles' Intrigues with Louis XIV; the Test Act. — 
Charles inclined to the Catholic worship, and wished to reestab- 
lish the Catholic Church, because he 
thought it more favorable than the 
Anglican to such a scheme of gov- 
ernment as he aimed to set up in 
England. In the year 1670 he made 
a secret treaty with the French king, 
the terms and objects of which were 
most scandalous. In return for aid 
which he was to render Louis in an 
attack upon Holland, he was to re- 
ceive from him a large sum of 
money, and, in case his proposed 
declaration in favor of the restoration 
of the Catholic Church produced any 
trouble in the island, the aid of 
French troops. The scheme was 
never consummated ; but these clan- 
destine negotiations, however, becom- 
ing an open secret, made the people 
very uneasy and suspicious. 

Under the excitement of the moment, Parliament enacted a 
so-called Test Act, which excluded Catholics from the House 

15 One of the churches destroyed was St. Paul's Cathedral, which was rebuilt 
with great magnificence. Its designer was the eminent architect, Sir Christopher 
Wren, near whose tomb within the building is this inscription: Si monumentum 
requiriSy circumspice^ " If you seek his monument, look around." 




Fig, 82. — Charles II 
(After the painting by Sir 
Peter Lely) 



446 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

of Lords.^^'' (They had already been shut out from the House of 
Commons by the oath of supremacy, which was required of com- 
moners though not of peers.) The disability created by this stat- 
ute was not removed from Catholics until the nineteenth century, 
— in the reign of George IV (sec. 669). 

494. "The Popish Plot" (1678). — The excited state of the 
public mind, owing to the continuance of the king's intrigues 
with Louis, led to a serious delusion and panic. A rumor was 
started that the Catholics had planned for England a St. Bartholo- 
mew's Day. The king, the members of Parliament, and all Prot- 
estants were to be massacred, the Catholic Church was to be 
reestablished, and the king's brother James, who was a zealous 
Catholic, placed on the throne. 

Each day the reports of the conspiracy grew more wild and 
exaggerated. Informers sprang up on every hand, each with a 
more terrifying story than the preceding. One of these witnesses, 
Titus Oates by name, a most infamous person, gained an extraor- 
dinary notoriety in exposing the imaginary plot. Many Catholics, 
convicted solely on the testimony of perjured witnesses, became 
the unfortunate victims of the delusion and fraud. 

495. The Habeas Corpus Act (1679). — The year following the 
" Popish Plot " Parliament passed the celebrated Habeas Corpus 
Act. This statute was intended to render more effectual the 
ancient and valued writ of habeas corpus, which was designed 
to protect the personal liberty of Englishmen, but which the 
king's courts and sheriffs were rendering well-nigh useless through 
their evasions and shifts. The law, which is based on articles of 
Magna Carta, is so carefully and ingeniously drawn that it is 
almost impossible for its provisions to be evaded in any way. It 
gives every person almost absolute security against illegal deten- 
tion in prison, and is the strongest safeguard against the attempts 
of a despotic ruler upon the liberty of those who may have incurred 
his displeasure. It has been the model of all laws of like import 
throughout the Anglo-Saxon world. 

15a An earlier Test Act (1673) excluded Catholics from civil and military offices. 



JAMES' ACCESSION 447 

Reign of Ja7?ies the Second {168^-1688) 

496. James' Accession ; his Despotic Course. — After a reign of 
just one quarter of a century Charles died in 1685, and was fol- 
lowed by his brother James, whose rule was destined to be short 
and troubled.^® 

James, like all the other Stuarts, held exalted notions of the 
divine right of kings to rule as they please, and at once set about 
carrying out these ideas in a most reckless manner. Notwith- 
standing he had given solemn assurances that he would uphold 
the Anghcan Church, he straightway set about the reestablish- 
ment of the Catholic worship. He arbitrarily prorogued and dis- 
solved Parliament. He formed a league against his own subjects 
with Louis XIV. The High Commission Court of Elizabeth, 
which had been abolished by Parliament, he practically restored 
in a new tribunal presided over by the infamous Jeffreys. 

The despotic course of the king raised up enemies on all 
sides. No party or sect, save the most zealous Catholics, stood by 
him. The Tory gentry were in favor of royalty indeed, but not 
of tyranny. Thinking to make friends of the Protestant dissenters, 
James issued a decree known as the Declaration of Indulgence, 
whereby he suspended all the laws against nonconformists. This 
edict all the clergy were ordered to read from their pulpits. 
Almost to a man they refused to do so. Seven bishops even dared 
to send the king a petition and remonstrance against his uncon- 
stitutional proceedings. 

The petitioners were thrust into the Tower, and soon afterward 
were brought to trial on the charge of " seditious hbel." The nation 
was now thoroughly aroused, and the greatest excitement prevailed 

16 James was barely seated upon the throne before the Duke of Monmouth, an 
illegitimate son of Charles II, who had been in exile in the Netherlands, asserted his 
right to the crown, and at the head of a hundred men invaded England. Thousands 
flocked to his standard, but in the battle of Sedgemoor (1685) he was utterly defeated 
by the royal troops. Terrible vengeance was wreaked upon all in any way connected 
with the rebellion. The notorious Chief Justice Jeffreys, in what were called the 
" Bloody Assizes," condemned to death 320 persons, and sentenced 841 to transpor- 
tation. Jeffreys conducted the so-called trials with incredible brutality. See Colby's 
Selections from the Sources of English History^ No. 81. 



448 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

while the trial was progressing. Judges and jury were overawed 
by the popular demonstration, and the bishops were acquitted. 

497. The Revolution of 1688 and the Declaration of Rights. — 
The crisis which it was easy to see was impending was hastened 
by the birth of a prince, as this cut off the hope of the nation 
that the crown upon James' death would descend to his Protes- 
tant daughter Mary, now wife of the Prince of Orange, Stadtholder 
of Holland. The most active of the king's enemies therefore 
resolved to bring about at once what they had been inclined to 
wait to have accomplished by his death. They sent an invitation 
to the Prince of Orange to come over with such force as he could 
muster and take possession of the government, pledging him 
the united and hearty support of the English nation. WilHam 
accepted the invitation and straightway began to gather his fleet 
and army for the enterprise. 

The moment the ships of the Prince touched the shores of the 
island, the army and people went over in a body to him. The King 
was absolutely deserted. Flight alone was left him. The queen 
with her infant child was secretly embarked for France, where the 
king soon after joined her. The last act of the king before leaving 
England was to disband the army and fling the Great Seal into 
the Thames.i"^ 

Almost the first act of the Prince was to issue a call for a con- 
vention to provide for the permanent settlement of the crown. 
This body met Jan. 22, 1689, and after a violent debate declared 
the throne to be vacant through James' misconduct and flight. 
They then resolved to confer the royal dignity upon William and 
his wife Mary as joint sovereigns of the realm. 

But this convention did not repeat the error of the Parliament 
that restored Charles II and give the crown to the Prince and 
Princess without proper safeguards and guaranties for the conduct 
of the government according to the ancient laws of the kingdom. 
They drew up the celebrated Declaration of Rights, which plainly 
rehearsed all the old rights and liberties of EngUshmen ; denied 

IT' In France the seK-exiled monarch and his family were kindly received by Louis, 
who kept UD for them the shadow of a court in one of the, royal palaces near Paris 



LITERATURE OF THE RESTORATION 449 

the right of the king to lay taxes or maintain an army without the 
consent of ParHament ; and asserted that freedom of debate was 
the inviolable privilege of both the Lords and the Commons. 
William and Mary were required to accept this declaration, and to 
agree to rule in accordance with its provisions, whereupon they 
were declared King and Queen of England (Feb. 13, 1689). In 
such manner was effected what is known in history as " the 
Glorious Revolution of 1688." 



Literature of the Restoration 

498. The Reaction from Puritanism ; Record of this Reaction in 
the Literature of the Period. — The reigns of the restored Stuarts 
mark the most corrupt period in the life of Enghsh society. The 
low standard of morals, and the general profligacy in manners, 
especially among the. higher classes, are in part attributable to the 
demoralizing example of a shockingly licentious and shameless 
court ; but in a larger measure, perhaps, should be viewed as the 
natural reaction from the over-stern, repellant Puritanism of the 
preceding period. The Puritans undoubtedly erred in their indis- 
criminate and wholesale denunciation of all forms of harmless 
amusement and innocent pleasure. They not only rebuked gam- 
ing, drinking, and profanity, and stopped bear baiting,^^ but they 
closed all the theaters, forbade the Maypole dances of the people, 
condemned as paganish the observance of Christmas, frowned 
upon sculpture as idolatrous and indecent, and considered any 
color or adornment in dress as utterly incompatible with a proper 
sense of the seriousness of life. 

Now all this was laying too heavy a burden upon human nature. 
The revolt and reaction came, as come they must. Upon the 
Restoration, society swung to the opposite extreme. In place of 
the solemn-visaged, psalm-singing Roundhead, we have the gay, 
roistering Cavalier. Faith gives place to infidelity, sobriety to 
drunkenness, purity to profligacy, economy to extravagance, Bible 

18 Macaulay humorously insists that the Puritans opposed bear baiting not 
because it gave pain to the bear but because it gave pleasure to the spectator. 



450 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

study, psalm singing, and exhorting to theater going, profanity, 
and carousing.* 

The Hterature of the age is a perfect record of this revolt against 
the " sour severity " of Puritanism, and a faithful reflection of the 
unblushing immorality of the times. The book most read and 
praised by Charles II and his court, and the one that best repre- 
sents the spirit of the victorious party, was the satirical poem of 
Hudibras by Samuel Butler. The object of the work was to satir- 
ize the cant and excesses of Puritanism, just as the Don Quixote 
of Cervantes burlesques the extravagances and follies of chivalry. 
Butler, however, displays a spirit of vindictiveness and hatred 
towards the object of his wit of which we find no trace in the 
good-natured Spanish humorist. 

So immoral and indecent are the works of the writers for the 
stage of this period that these authors have acquired the designa- 
tion of " the corrupt dramatists." Holding a prominent place 
among them was the poet Dryden. 

IV. Reign of William and Mary (i 689-1 702) 

499. The Bill of Rights (Dec. 16, 1689). — The Revolution 
of 1688 and the settlement of the crown upon William and Mary 
marks an epoch in the constitutional history of England. It 
settled forever the long dispute between king and Parliament, — 
and settled it in favor of the latter. The Bill of Rights, which 
was substantially the articles of the Declaration of Rights framed 
into a law, and which was one of the earliest acts of the first Par- 
liament under WilUam and Mary, in effect " transferred sovereignty 
from the king to the House of Commons." 

By shutting out James from the throne and bringing in William, 
and by the exclusion of Catholic heirs from the succession, it 
plainly announced that the kings of England derive their right 
and title to rule not from the accident of birth but from the will 
of the people, and that Parhament may depose any king, and, 
excluding from the throne his heirs, settle the crown anew in 
another family. This uprooted quite thoroughly the doctrine that 



SETTLEMENT OF THE REVENUE 45 1 

princes have a divine and inalienable right to the throne of their 
ancestors, and when once seated on that throne rule simply as the 
vicegerents of God, above all human censure and control. We 
shall hear constantly less and less in England of this theory of 
government which for so long a time overshadowed and threatened 
the freedom of the English people. 

The separate provisions of the bill, following closely the language 
of the Declaration, denied the dispensing power of the crown, — 
that is to say, the authority claimed by the Stuarts of annulling a 
law by a royal edict ; forbade the king to usurp the functions of 
the courts of justice, to levy taxes, or to keep an army in time of 
peace without the consent of Parliament ; asserted the right of the 
people to petition for redress of grievances and freely to choose 
their representatives ; reaffirmed, as one of the ancient privileges 
of both Houses, perfect freedom of debate j and demanded that 
Parliament should be frequently assembled. 

Mindful of Charles' attempt to reestablish the Catholic wor- 
ship, the framers of this same Bill of Rights further declared that 
all persons holding communion with the Church of Rome or 
uniting in marriage with a CathoHc should be " forever incapable 
to possess, inherit, or enjoy the crown and government of the 
realm." Since the Revolution of 1688 no Catholic has worn the 
English crown. 

All of these provisions now became inwrought into the English 
constitution, and from this time forward were recognized as part 
of the fundamental law of the realm. 

500. Settlement of the Revenue. — The articles of the Bill of 
Rights were made effectual by appropriate legislation. One thing 
which had made the Tudors and Stuarts so independent of Parlia- 
ment was the custom which prevailed of granting to each king, at 
the beginning of his reign, the ordinary revenue of the kingdom 
during his life. This income, with what could be raised by gifts, 
benevolences, monopolies, and similar expedients, had enabled 
despotically inclined sovereigns to administer the government, 
wage war, and engage in any wild enterprise just as individual 
caprice or ambition might dictatet AU this was now changed, 



452 STUARTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION 

Parliament, instead of granting William the revenue for life, 
restricted the grant to a single year, and made it a penal offense 
for the officers of the treasury to pay out money otherwise than 
ordered by Parhament. 

We cannot overestimate the importance of this change in the 
English constitution. It is this control of the purse of the nation 
which has made the House of Commons — for all money bills 
must originate in the Lower House — the actual seat of govern- 
ment, constituting them the arbiters of peace and war.^® 

501. James attempts to recover the Throne : Battle of the Boyne 
(1690). — The first years of William's reign were disturbed by 
the efforts of James to regain the throne which he had abandoned. 
In these attempts he was aided by Louis XIV, and by the 
Jacobites,^° the name given to the adherents of the exile king. 
The Irish gave William the most trouble, but in the decisive 
battle of the Boyne he gained a great victory over them. 

The results of the battle of the Boyne broke the spirit of the 
revolt, and soon all Ireland acknowledged the authority of William. 
The Protestant Irish, or Orangemen, as they are called, still keep 
fresh the memory of the great victory by the celebration, even in 
the cities of the New World, of the anniversary of the event. 

502. Plans and Death of William. — The motive which had 
most strongly urged William to respond to the invitation of 
the EngUsh revolutionists to assume the crown of England was 
his desire to turn the arms and resources of that country against 
the great champion of despotism and the dangerous neighbor of 
his own native country, Louis XIV of France. 

The conduct of Louis in lending aid to James in his attempt 
to regain his crown had so enraged the English that they were 
quite ready to support WilUam in his wars against him, and so 

19 The most important constitutional matter of William's reign after those men- 
tioned in the text were the passage by Parliament of the Mutiny Bill, by which the 
command of the army was given to the king for one year only, and of the act of Set- 
tlement (June 12, 1701), which was "an act for the further limitation of the crown, 
and better securing the rights and liberties of the subject." The most important article 
of this act, after that determining the succession, was one providing that the judges 
should hold office during good behavior, not simply at the will of the king, as hitherta 

20 From Jacobus^ Latin for " James." 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 453 

the English and Dutch sailors fough| side by side against the 
common enemy in the War of the Palatinate (sec. 450). 

A short time after the Peace of Ryswick, broke out the War 
of the Spanish Succession (sec. 451). In the midst of prepara- 
tions for this war William was fatally hurt by being thrown from 
his horse (1702). 

A contemporary, Bishop Burnet, speaks as follows of King 
William and his place among English sovereigns : "I considered 
him as a person raised up by God to resist the power of France 
and the progress of tyranny and persecution. . . . After all the 
abatements that may be allowed for his errors and faults, he ought 
still to be reckoned among the greatest princes that our history, 
or indeed that of any other, affords." ^i 

Selections from the Sources. — In opposition to Filmer, Patriarcha 
(see Sources for Chapter XXVI), read Milton, The Tenure of Kings and 
Magistrates. Of the utmost importance for the period of the Civil War and 
the Commonwealth are The Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell, with 
elucidations by Thomas Carlyle (ed. by S. C. Lomas). For additional 
material see Henderson, Side Lights on English History, pp. 33-214; 
Lee, Source-Book, pp. 335-438 ; Colby, Selections, Nos. 68-85 : and Ken- 
dall, Source-Book, chaps, xi-xv. 

Secondary Works. — Gardiner, History of England; History of the 
Great Civil War ; History of the Commonwealth and Protectorate ; Oliver 
Cromwell, and The First Two Stuarts and the Puritan Revolution, 1603- 
1660. Dr. Gardiner made this, period especially his own. His works are 
of the highest authority and value. Macaulay, The History of England 
from the Accession of fames II; also his Essays on Milton and John Hamp- 
den. Gold win Smith, Three English Statesmen ; for two lectures on 
Pym and Cromwell. Morley, Oliver Cromzvell ; Harrison, Oliver Crom- 
well. Hale, The Fall of the Stuarts. Airy, The English Restoration and 
Louis XIV. Wakeman, The Church of the Puritans. Prendergast, The 
Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland. The admirable articles in the Diction- 
ary of National Biography should not be overlooked. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The character and traits of James I and 
his D(Emonologie. 2. The Plantation of Ulster in Ireland. 3. Thomas 
Wentworth (Earl of Strafford). 4. The Irish " Cromwellian Settlement." 
5. Milton's Defense of the English People. 6. The Great Plague. 7. But- 
ler's Hudibras. 

21 Mary had preceded William, having died in 1694, and as they left no children, 
the crown descended to the Princess Anne, Mary's sister, the wife of Prince George 
of Denmark. 



CHAPTER XXIX 
THE RISE OF RUSSIA: PETER THE GREAT (1682-1725) 

503. General Remarks. — We left Russia at the close of the 
Middle Ages a semi-savage, semi- Asiatic power, so hemmed in by 
barbarian bands and hostile races as to be almost entirely cut off 
from intercourse with the civilized world (sec. 266). In the 
present chapter we shall tell how her boundaries were pushed out 
to the sea on every side, — to the Caspian, to the Euxine, and to 
the Baltic, — and how she was initiated as a member of the 
European family of nations. The main interest of our story will 
gather about Peter the Great, whose almost superhuman strength 
and energy it was that first lifted the great barbarian nation to 
a prominent place among the Western states. 

504. Ivan the Terrible (15 33-1 5 84). — The most noteworthy 
name among the rulers of Russia after the opening of the modern 
era is that of Ivan IV, surnamed " the Terrible," on account of his 
many cruel and revengeful acts. While yet a child of thirteen years 
he caused a boyar, or noble, who had offended him, to be torn in 
pieces in his presence by dogs. Towards the close of his reign 
he killed his eldest son with a blow of his iron staff. At Nov- 
gorod, in punishment for a supposed conspiracy of the nobles, he 
put to death over fifteen hundred persons. 

But Ivan, despite his terribly cruel disposition, did much to 
extend and consolidate the Russian dominions. He wrested 
from the Tartars Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1554), and thus 
gained possession of the entire length of the Volga, — the most 
important highway of commerce within the Russian Empire, — 
and extended the limits of his dominions to the shores of the 
Caspian. " In the Russian annals," says Rambaud, " the expe- 
dition to Kazan occupies the same glorious place as the defeat 

454 



THE HOUSE OF ROMANOV 455 

of Abderrahman in the history of the Franks." From that day to 
this Russia has steadily pushed the Turanian peoples back from 
their conquests in Europe, and as steadily encroached upon their 
domains in Asia. Even before the death of Ivan the Ural Moun- 
tains had been crossed and the conquest of Siberia fairly begun. 

In 1547 Ivan assumed at his coronation the title of " Tsar. " ^ In 
adopting this imposing title it was his purpose not only to pro- 
claim the new dignity and power with which favoring fortune 
had invested the Grand Princes of Moscow but also to give 
expression to the idea that the Muscovite rulers were the heirs 
and successors of the Caesars of Constantinople. He maintained 
that " if Constantinople had been the second, Moscow was the 
third Rome, — the living heir of the Eternal City." 

505. Beginning of the House of Romanov (16 13); Accession of 
Peter the Great (1682). — The line of the old Norseman Rurik 
ended in 1598. Then followed a. period of confusion and of 
foreign invasion known as the "Troublous Times," after which, 
in 1 61 3, Michael Romanov, the first of the family that bears his 
name, was chosen Tsar. The dynasty thus founded held the 
throne until the Revolution of March, 19 17. 

For more than half a century after the accession of the Romanovs 
there is little either in the genius or the deeds of any of the line 
calculated to draw our special attention. But towards the close 
of the seventeenth century there ascended the Russian throne 
"a man of miracles," — a man whose genius and energy and 
achievements instantly drew the gaze of the world, and who has 
elicited the admiration and wonder of all succeeding generations. 
This was Peter I, later to be known as Peter the Great, one of the 
most remarkable characters of history. He was but seventeen years 
of age when he assumed the full responsibilities of government. 

506. Peter*s Character. — And here, as Peter steps upon the 
stage to play his great part in the drama of history, we must 
notice what sort of man he was.' 

1 This was the title given by Russian writers to potentates, in particular to the 
Caesars of Rome and Constantinople. Ivan III (1462-1505) had made use of the title 
in his correspondence, but Ivan IV was the first Russian prince upon whom the title 
was formally bestowed at his coronation. 



456 



THE RISE OF RUSSIA 



Like Philip II of Spain, Peter was the true child of his race. 
In him all the forces of the Russian race life seem to have been 
concentrated. " Never," says his latest biographer (Waliszewski), 
" never have the collective qualities of a nation, good and bad, 
been so summed up in a single personality, destined to be its 
historical type. . . . Peter is Russia, — her flesh and blood, her 

temperament, her vir- 
tues, and her vices." 
Peter has been 
likened to the legend- 
ary heroes of the Rus- 
sian and the Gothic 
race. He was a man 
of elemental forces 
and passions. He 
had fits of Berserker 
rage, — wild frenzies 
during which the life 
of no one about him 
was safe. He in- 
dulged in astonishing 
drinking bouts and 
dehghted in buffoon- 
ery and coarse jests. 
But over against 
Peter's vices were set 
many virtues. He 
worked strenuously 
at his kingly trade, 
not alone from sheer 
love of work but because work was to him a duty. He was not with- 
out truly royal thoughts, like those of the best of the enlightened 
despots, in regard to the nature of the kingly office. He is said 
to have uttered this sentiment : "I am the first servant of my 
people." And this was not a mere sentiment with him, as the 
following story witnesses. One day he visited a park which he 




Fig. 83. — Peter the Great (After i 
painting by Karel de Moor) 



THE STATE OF RUSSIA 457 

had made, and was surprised to find no one in it. " Do the peo- 
ple suppose," he inquired, " that I have set so many hands at 
work and spent so much money simply for my own benefit ? " And 
then he ordered proclamation to be made that the park belonged 
to the people and that they were to use it as their own. 

507. The State of Russia when Peter assumed the Government. 
— In order to understand what Peter did for Russia we must ac- 
quaint ourselves with the condition of the country when he took 
into his hands the shaping of its destinies. 

In the first place, we should note the geographical isolation of 
Russia. At this time she possessed only one seaport. Archangel, 
on the White Sea, which harbor for a large part of the year is 
sealed against vessels by the extreme cold of that high latitude. 
The Tartars and Turks cut her oif from the Black Sea ; the terri- 
tories of the Swedes and the Poles intervened between her and 
the Baltic. She looked towards Asia, to which continent she in 
fact belonged. When in 1648 the European states readjusted their 
affairs in the great Westphalian peace, Russia had no lot or part 
in the convention, not simply because she had stood aloof from 
the Thirty Years' War, but also because she was not then regarded 
as forming a part of Europe. 

In the second place, we should recall how Russia had been 
actually Asiaticized through her long subjection to the Mongol 
hordes (sec. 175). That tide of conquest, it is true, had now 
ebbed. But "the flood," as Waliszewski says, "receding from 
the soil had left behind it, Hke a heavy deposit, all its stable ele- 
ments, — forms of government, customs, and habits of thought." 
The Russia which had emerged was, as our author says, essentially 
Asiatic and barbarous. 

508. Peter's Task ; his Programme not wholly Original. — 
Peter's task was to break Russia's isolation and to undo the work 
of the Tartar conquerors, — to make again European what they 
had made Asiatic. Hence one essential part of Peter's pro- 
gramme was to wrest the Euxine from the hands of the Turks and 
the eastern shores of the Baltic from the grasp of the Swedes. 
Thus would he gain for Russia her first great need, — access to 



458 THE RISE OF RUSSIA 

the sea. Thus would he break that isolation which had done so 
much to keep the country in the rear of the nations of Western 
Europe in the march of progress. 

Another essential article of Peter's policy was the introduction 
into Russia of the ideas, customs, arts, and industries of Western 
Europe, — in a word, to make Russia in her thoughts, ideals, and 
institutions a member of the European family of nations. 

This programme of Peter's, it should be noted, was not wholly 
original with him. Russia had gradually been preparing for his 
advent. Her expansion towards water frontiers had already 
begun. The Caspian had been reached, Siberia had been over- 
run, and a firm foothold secured on the Pacific shore. Thus 
Peter simply gave a fresh impulse to an expansion movement 
already well under way. 

It was the same in regard to Peter's internal reforms. The 
leaven of Western ideas was already working in the mass of 
Russian conservatism, causing in some minds a great fermenta- 
tion and calling into existence a party of reform and progress. 
At Moscow there was a large settlement of foreigners, including 
German and other merchants, and adventurers from almost every 
land of the West. It was in the free air of this foreign suburb that 
Peter, while yet a mere boy, overjoyed to escape from the suffo- 
cating atmosphere of the palace, spent much of his time, and here 
it was that he got his advanced ideas. Among the foreign residents 
of the palace with whom Peter fraternized were the Swiss Lefort, 
the Scotch Gordon, and the Dutch Timmermann. Through these 
and other foreign companions it was that Peter learned how back- 
ward and barbarous his own country was compared with the pro- 
gressive and civilized states of the West.. 

509. The Conquest of Azov (1696). — In 1695 Peter sailed 
down the Don and made an attack upon Azov, the key to the 
Black Sea, but was unsuccessful. The next year, however, repeat- 
ing the attempt, he succeeded, and thus gained his first harbor 
on the south. 

No sooner had Peter secured his new harbor than he set in 
earnest about the construction of a marine fleet (i 696-1697), in 




,s -a 




3 




1 
1 


1 




Scale oX Mile 
Denmark an 
Sweden 
Poland and 
Russia 
Prussia and 
Souse of Au 
Turks 


y 


u 


y 


J 




jy 




PETER'S FIRST VISIT TO THE WEST 45^ 

which enterprise he was aided by shipwrights whom he had called 
from Venice and other Western states. So energetically was the 
work pushed that in less than two years a great fleet of war ships 
was floating upon the streams running to the Sea of Azov. 

510. Peter's First ^ Visit to the West (1697-1698). — With a 
view to advancing his naval projects, Peter about this time sent 
a large number of young Russian nobles to Italy, Holland, and 
England to acquire in those countries a knowledge of naval affairs, 
forbidding them to return before they had become good sailors. 

Not satisfied with thus sending to foreign parts his young nobil- 
ity, Peter formed the somewhat startling resolution of going abroad 
himself and learning the art of shipbuilding by personal experience 
in the dockyards of Holland. Accordingly, in the year 1697, leav- 
ing the government in the hands of three nobles, he set out for 
the Netherlands. 

Peter, with his uncouth barbarian suite, made a great sensation 
as he traveled westward. His passage with his court was like the 
passage of a horde of untamed Cossacks. Peter himself often acted 
like a savage and made his entertainers no end of trouble and 
anxiety. At Konigsberg he asked to see a man broken on the 
wheel. The authorities explained to him that they were unable 
to gratify his wish, since there was no criminal at hand condemned 
to undergo that form of punishment. Peter was astonished that 
thai; should stand in the way of his seeing how the instrument 
worked. "What a fuss about killing a man ! " he said. 

The palaces in which Peter and his company were lodged were 
left in a condition that could hardly have been worse had they 
been subjected to a regular siege. Prudent hosts removed every- 
thing breakable from the apartments designed for the accommo- 
dation of the "barbarian court." ^ 

2 Peter made a second European tour in 1716-1717. 

3 Wilhelmina, the sister of Frederick the Great of Prussia, who saw Peter and his 
company at Berlin when the Tsar was on his second visit to the West some years 
after this, gives in her Memoirs the following amusing account of what happened at 
the summer palace, near the capital, where Peter and his suite were lodged. Recount- 
ing the prudent measures taken by the queen to minimize the inevitable damage, she 
writes : " In order to prevent the mischief which the Russian gentlemen had done in 
other places where they had lodged, the queen ordered the principal furniture, and 



460 THE RISE OF RUSSIA 

Upon reaching the Netherlands Peter proceeded to Zaandam, 
a place a short distance from Amsterdam. After a week's stay 
here, in order to escape the annoyance of the crowds, Peter left 
the place and went to the docks of the East India Company at 
Amsterdam, who set about building a frigate that he might see 
the whole process of constructing a vessel from the beginning. 
Here he worked for four months, being known among his fellow- 
workmen as Baas or Master Peter. 

It was not alone the art of naval architecture in which Peter 
interested himself ; he attended lectures on anatomy, studied sur- 
gery, gained some skill in pulling teeth and in bleeding, inspected 
paper mills, flour mills, printing presses, and factories, and visited 
cabinets, hospitals, and museums, thus acquainting himself with 
every industry and art that he thought might be advantageously 
introduced into his own country. 

From Holland Master Peter went to England to study her 
superior naval establishment and to learn " the why " and " the 
wherefore." Here he was fittingly received by King William III, 
who had presented Peter while in Holland with a splendid yacht 
fully equipped, and who now made his guest extremely happy by 
getting up for him a naval review. 

While in England Peter gathered a company of several hundred 
engineers, captains, surgeons, mechanics, and persons learned in 
the various sciences, and by magnificent promises — which the 
truth requires us to say were very badly kept — induced them 
to go to Russia to help him build fleets, train soldiers, cut canals, 
and Europeanize his country. Returning from England to Hol- 
land, Peter went thence to Vienna, intending to visit Venice; 

whatever was most brittle, to be removed." And this is what she has to say of the 
condition of the palace after the Russian guests had left it : " What desolation was 
there visible ! I never beheld anything like it ;. indeed, I think Jerusalem after its 
siege and capture could not have presented such another scene. This elegant palace 
was left by them in so ruinous a state that the queen was absolutely obliged to rebuild 
the whole of it." A similar story comes from England. The English government 
lodged Peter and his court in the fine residence of the celebrated writer, John Evelyn. 
The owner of the premises felt constrained to ask the government to pay for the 
injury they had sustained. The damages were carefully assessed and amounted to 
£ZS^ 9s. 6d. 



PETER DISBANDS THE STRELTSI 461 

but hearing of an insurrection at home, he set out in haste for 
Moscow. 

511. Peter disbands the Streltsi and creates a New Army after 
Western Models. — The revolt which had hastened Peter's return 
from the West was an uprising among the Streltsi, a body of mili- 
tia, numbering twenty or thirty thousand, who formed the nearest 
thing to a standing Russian army. In their ungovernable turbu- 
lence they remind us of the Pretorians of the Roman emperors, 
or the Janizaries of the later Turkish sultans. The present mutiny 
had been suppressed before Peter's arrival, so that there was noth- 
ing now remaining for him to do save to mete out punishment to 
the ringleaders, of whom a thousand or more were put to death 
with the crudest tortures. Peter beheaded some of the wretches 
with his own hands, and compelled the nobles of his court also 
to help strike off the heads of the condemned. Nothing better 
illus_trates the barbarism of the Russia of Peter's time than the 
fact that his acting thus as an executioner never shocked his 
subjects in the least. 

This revolt settled Peter in his determination to rid himself 
altogether of the insolent and turbulent Streltsi. A royal edict 
disbanded those regiments that had had any part in the uprising ; 
a subsequent revolt led to the abolition of the remaining regi- 
ments. Thus at a blow did the resolute Peter destroy a power 
that had come to overshadow the throne itself. The place of the 
Streltsi was taken by a well-discipHned force trained according to 
the tactics of the Western nations. 

512. Peter*s Other Reforms. — The reorganization of the Rus- 
sian military system was only one of the many reforms undertaken 
by Peter. The variety of these was so great, and Peter's manner 
of effecting them so harsh and strenuous, that, as one has aptly 
expressed it, he fairly "knouted the Russians into civilization." 

As outgrowths of what he had seen or heard or had had sug- 
gested to him on his foreign tour, Peter issued a new coinage, 
introduced schools, built factories, constructed roads and canals, 
established a postal system, opened mines, framed laws modeled 
after those of the West, and reformed the government of the 



462 THE RISE OF RUSSIA 

towns in such a way as to give the citizens some voice in the 
management of their local affairs, as he had observed was done 
in the Netherlands and in England. 

Most important in its political as well as religious consequences 
was Peter's reform in the ecclesiastical system. At this time the 
Russian Church formed a sort of state within the state. The head 
of the Church, bearing the title of Patriarch, was a kind of Rus- 
sian pope. Through his censorship of the temporal authority and 
his interference in matters secular, he hampered and embarrassed 
the government. Peter put an end to this state of things. He 
abolished the patriarchate, and in its place created an adminis- 
trative body, appointed by himself and called the Holy Synod, to 
take charge of ecclesiastical affairs. Thus the last restraint upon 
the authority of the Tsar was destroyed. The Russian govern- 
ment became an unlimited monarchy of the purest Oriental type. 

513. Charles XII of Sweden; the Swedish Monarchy at his 
Accession. — Peter's history now becomes intertwined with that of 
a man quite as remarkable as himself, — Charles XII of Sweden. 
Charles was but fifteen years of age when, in 1697, the death of 
his father called him to the Swedish throne.'* 

Sweden was at this time one of the great powers of Europe. 
The basis of her greatness had been laid during the period of 
the Reformation. The traditions of the hero Gustavus Adolphus 
cast a halo about the Swedish throne. The ideal of this great 
sovereign had been the creation of a state embracing all the 
lands bordering upon the Baltic. In a certain measure this 
magnificent ideal had been realized. The Baltic was virtually 
a Swedish lake, — the Mediterranean of an empire which aspired 
to be the mistress of the North. 

But unfortunately Sweden could not maintain such a sea empire 
without hemming in and cramping in their normal development, 
territorial or commercial, various neighboring states, — in particular 



4 The government of Sweden had now become an absolute autocracy. In 1693 the 
Riksdag, or Diet, had proclaimed the Swedish monarch to be an "all-commanding 
sovereign-king responsible for his actions to none on earth, but with authority as a 
Christian king to rule as it seemetb to him best," 



THE BATTLE OF NARVA 463 

Russia, Poland, and Denmark. In this situation lay hidden the 
germ of the long and obstinate so-named Swedish Wars, which were 
essentially a struggle for the control of the Baltic. 

The accession to the throne of the young and inexperienced 
Charles offered to the jealous enemies and watchful rivals of 
Sweden seemingly too good an opportunity to be lost for pushing 
her back into the northern peninsula. Accordingly three sover- 
eigns, Frederick IV of Denmark, Augustus the Strong, Elector of 
Saxony and King of Poland, and Peter the Great of Russia, 
leagued against him for the purpose of appropriating such por- 
tions of his dominions as they severally coveted. 

514. The Battle of Narva (1700). — But the conspirators had 
formed a wrong estimate of the young Swedish monarch. Not- 
withstanding the insane follies in which he was accustomed to 
indulge, he possessed talent; especially had he a remarkable 
aptitude for military affairs, though lacking many of the qualities 
of a great commander. 

With a well-trained force — a veteran army that had not yet 
forgotten the discipline of the hero Gustavus Adolphus — Charles 
now threw himself first upon the Danes, and in two weeks forced 
the Danish king to sue for peace ; then he turned his Httle army 
of eight thousand men upon the Russian forces of twenty thou- 
sand, which were besieging the city of Narva, on the Gulf of 
Finland, and inflicted upon them a most ignominious defeat. 
The only comment of the imperturbable Peter upon the disaster 
was, " The Swedes will have the advantage of us at first, but they 
will teach us how to beat them." 

5 15. The Founding of St. Petersburg (1703). — After chastising 
the Tsar at Narva, the Swedish king turned south and marched into 
Poland to punish Augustus for the part he had taken in the conspir- 
acy against him. While Charles was busied in this quarter, Peter, 
having made good by. strenuous exertions his loss in men and arms 
at Narva, was gradually making himself master of the Swedish 
lands on the Baltic, and upon a marshy island at the mouth of 
the Neva was laying the foundations of the city of Petersburg, 
which he proposed to make the western gateway of his empire. 



464 THE RISE OF RUSSIA 

The spot selected by Peter as the site of his new capital was 
low and subject to inundation/ so that the labor requisite to 
make it fit for building purposes was simply enormous. But 
difficulties never dismayed Peter. He gathered workmen from 
all parts of his dominions, cut down and dragged to the spot 
whole forests for piles and buildings, and caused a city to rise 
as if by magic from the morasses. The splendid capital stands 
to-day one of the most impressive monuments of the indomitable 
and despotic energy of Peter. 

516. Invasion of Russia by Charles XII ; the Battle of Poltava 
(1709). — Having defeated the armies of King Augustus and 
given his crown to another, Charles was now ready to turn his 
attention once more to the Tsar. With an army of barely forty 
thousand men he began his eastward march. It soon developed 
that his bold plan was to strike the ancient capital Moscow, and 
there to dictate terms of peace. 

It was a terrible march that the Swedes made, a march some- 
what like that of the Grand Army under Napoleon a century 
later. The Russian tactics were almost the same now as then, 
the villages being abandoned and burned, and the entire country 
made a desert in front of the advancing Swedes. 

Thus impeded in his march, Charles suddenly gave up his 
direct advance upon Moscow and turned south into the Ukraine. 
Here he finally laid siege to the town of Poltava. Peter marched 
to its relief, and the two armies met in decisive combat in front 
of the place. The Swedish army was virtually annihilated. Escap- 
ing with a few followers from the field, Charles fled southward 
and found an asylum in Turkey.® 

5 Peter tells us of an inundation which occurred in 1706. "It was amusing," he 
writes, " to see how the people sat on roofs and trees, just as in the time of the 
Deluge." In selecting such a marshy site for his capital, Peter may have been aiming 
to reproduce Amsterdam, in which city he had spent so much of his time when abroad. 

6 After spending five years among the Turks, during which time he acted in a 
manner which abundantly justified his title of the " Madman of the North," Charles 
returned to Sweden. Soon after his return he was killed in battle. At the time of 
his death Charles was only thirty-six years of age. Perhaps we can understand him 
best by regarding him, as his biographer Voltaire suggests, as an old Norse sea king 
bom ten centuries after his time. He was indeed " the last of the Vikings." 



SIGNIFICANCE OF PETER'S WORK 465 

517. Russia's Title to Baltic Land confirmed ; Peter's Death. — 
In 1 72 1 the Swedish Wars which had so long disturbed Europe 
were brought to an end by the Peace of Nystad, which con- 
firmed Russia's title to all the eastern Baltic lands that Peter 
had wrested from the Swedes. The undisputed possession of so 
large a strip of the Baltic seaboard . vastly increased the impor- 
tance and influence of Russia, which now assumed a place among 
the leading European powers. 

Peter's eventful reign was now drawing to a close. Four years 
after the end of the Swedish Wars, being then in his fifty-fourth 
year, he died of a fever brought on by his excesses and care- 
less exposures. It was characteristic of his lack of prudence and 
foresight that he left no will nor any directions regarding the 
succession to the throne. 

518. Peter's Significance for Russian History. — Probably in 
the case of no other European nation has any single personaHty 
left so deep and abiding an impress upon the national life and 
history as Peter the Great left upon Russian society and Russian 
history. He planted throughout his vast empire the seeds of 
Western civihzation, and by his giant strength lifted the great 
nation which destiny had placed in his hands out of Asiatic 
barbarism into the society of the European peoples. 

But it is the remote influence of Peter's work upon the Rus- 
sian government which is of special interest to us as students of 
the Political Revolution. In destroying all checks, military and 
ecclesiastical, upon the power of the crown, Peter, it is true, 
rendered the Russian government a perfect despotism of the 
Asiatic type. But in bringing into his dominions Western civili- 
zation, he introduced influences which were destined in time to 
neutrahze all he had done in the way of strengthening the basis 
of despotism. He introduced a civilization which fosters popular 
liberties and undermines personal despotic government. "No 
avowed champion of the people, aided by the most favorable 
circumstances," says Noble, "could have done such effective 
battle for Russiah liberties as that compassed by the champion 
of absolute power. . . . Peter was the first to fairly roll RussiaB 



466 



THE RISE OF RUSSIA 




tyranny in the Nessus shirt of European civilization. This was 
the reformer's real significance for the national life." 

519. Reign of Catherine the Great (17 62-1 796); the Partition 
of Poland. — From the death of Peter on to the close of the 
eighteenth century the Russian throne was held, the greater part 
of the time, by women, the most noted of whom w^as Catherine II, 
the Great, who was one of the most distinguished representatives 
of the so-called enlightened despots (sec. 439). But while a woman 

of great genius she 
had most serious 
faults of character, 
being incredibly 
profligate and un- 
scrupulous. 

Carrying out ably 
the policy of Peter 
the Great,. Catherine 
extended vastly the 
limits of Russian 
dominion and opened 
the country even 
more thoroughly than 
he had done to the 
entrance of Western 
influences. She was 
a genuine admirer of 
the French philoso- 
phers and was at 
pains to disseminate their teachings in her dominions. Aside 
from internal reforms, the most noteworthy matters of Catherine's 
reign were her conquest of the Crimea and her participation in 
the dismemberment of Poland. 

It was in the year 1783 that Catherine effected the subjugation 
and annexation to Russia of the Crimea. The possession of this 
peninsula gave Russia dominion on the Black Sea, which once 
virtually secured by Peter the Great had been again lost through 








Fig. 84. 



Catherine II of Russia. 
a portrait by Rosselin) 



(Aftc 



THE PARTITION 

OF POLAND 

I 

50 50 100 150 200. 

I ■ r I I I I 1 I I 

Scale of Miles. 

□ Ten'itories taken | .Territories taken 
by Eussia J 1 by Austria 

(ZI^Territorjes taken by Prussia gf 



THE M.-N.WORKS, BUFFALO. 



REIGN OF CATHERINE THE GREAT 467 

his misfortunes. This extension of the rule of the Muscovite to 
the Euxine was a matter of great moment to all Eastern Europe ; 
for now, as Freeman says, " the road through which so many 
Turanian invaders had pressed into the Aryan continent was 
blocked forever." 

On the West Catherine succeeded, by intrigue and the most 
shameful disregard of the law of nations, in greatly extending the 
limits of her dominions. This she effected at the expense of 
Poland, the partition of which state she planned in connection 
with Frederick the Great of Prussia and Maria Theresa of Austria. 
On the first division, which was made in 1772, the royal robbers 
each took a portion of the spoils. This act of brigandage was con- 
summated in spite of the efforts of patriotic Poles for reform, the 
anarchical condition of the Polish state being the pretext of the 
despoiling sovereigns for their action."^ 

It is difficult to apportion the blame among the participators 
in this transaction. Maria Theresa seems to have been the only 
one connected with the iniquitous business who had any scruples 
of conscience respecting the act. She justly characterized the 
proposed partition as downright robbery, for a long time stood 
out against it, and yielded at last and took her portion only when 
she reahzed that she was powerless to prevent the others from 
carrying out the policy of dismemberment. 

In 1793 a second partition was made, this time between Russia 
and Prussia ; and then, in 1 795 , after the suppression of a determined 

7 The Polish constitution was a survival of the age of mediaeval feudal anarchy. 
In the struggle here between the royal power and the feudal nobility the aristocracy 
had triumphed, and had reduced the kingly authority to the mere shadow of elective 
kingship. One particular -source of the anarchical state of things was a provision of 
the constitution which gave to every single member of the Diet the right and power 
to defeat any measure by his vote cast in opposition {liberum veto). Every noble was 
virtually a king. But it must be added that this anarchical state of the kingdom can- 
not be pleaded by the dismemberers of Poland in extenuation of their crime, for they 
in every possible way prevented all schemes of reform and fostered the anarchy 
because it served their interests and furthered their plans to do so. Louis XIV of 
France gave his ambassador these instructions : " The government of Poland must 
be regarded as an anarchy ; but this anarchy serves the interests of France, and so it 
must be fostered." Further, an admirable new constitution was drawn up for Poland 
in 1 791, which would have made it a strong state had a chance been allowed. 



468 THE RISE OF RUSSIA 

revolt of the Poles under the lead of the patriot Kosciuszko, 
a third and final division among the three powers completed the 
dismemberment of the unhappy state and erased its name from 
the map of Europe. 

This was the first instance in two hundred years of the destruc- 
tion of a sovereign Christian state by sister states. Unfortunately 
the pages of the history of the following century were to be stained 
with the record of many similar acts of international brigandage, 
yet by none quite as wicked or as far-reaching in its regrettable 
consequences as was this assassination of Poland. 

The territory gained by Russia in the dismemberment of Poland 
brought her western frontier close alongside the civilization of 
Central Europe. In Catherine's phrase, Poland had become her 
"door mat," upon which she stepped when visiting the West. 

By the close of Catherine's reign Russia was beyond question 
one of the foremost powers of Europe, and was henceforward to 
have a voice in all matters of general European concern. She 
was destined to play an important part in the Napoleonic Wars 
and in the great struggle between the people and their despotic 
rulers, — a struggle already inaugurated on the Continent by the 
Revolutionists in France. 

Selections from the Sources. — Sigismund von Herberstein, Notes 
upon Rtissia (Hakluyt Society publications). The author of these valuable 
" Notes " was a German ambassador at the Russian court during the 
years 151 7-1 526. 

Secondary Works. — Rambaud, History of Russia. This is the best 
comprehensive history of Russia available in English. Schuyler, Peter the 
Great, Emperor of Russia. The best biography of the great Tsar. For a 
shorter, delightfully written life, see Motley, Peter the Great. Morfill, 
Story of Russia, chaps, v-ix, and Story of Poland, chap, xi ; the last for the 
Partition of Poland. Bain, Charles XII. There have recently appeared 
from the pen of a brilliant writer biographies of Peter the Great and Cath- 
erine II, but unfortunately they are works which cannot be recommended 
as wholesome reading for the young, or as impartial history. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Geography of the Russian Empire. 
2. Ivan the Terrible. 3. Peter's boyhood. 4. The founding of St. Peters- 
burg. 5. Charles XII at Bender in Turkey. 6. Peter and his son and heir 
Alexis. 7. Catherine the Great and the Partition of Poland. 



CHAPTER XXX 

THE RISE OF PRUSSIA: FREDERICK THE GREAT 

(1740-1786) 

520. The Beginnings of Prussia. — The foundation of the 
Prussian kingdom was laid in the beginning of the seventeenth 
century (in 161 1) by the union of two small states south of the 
Baltic, one in Germany and one in Poland. These were the Elect- 
orate of Brandenburg and the Duchy of Prussia. Brandenburg 
had been gradually growing into prominence since the tenth cen- 
tury. Its ruler at the time of the union was a prince of the noted 
House of Hohenzollern, and was one of the seven princes to whom 
belonged the right of electing the Emperor. 

Prussia, so called from the Borussi, a tribe of desperate heathen 
of Lithuanian race, was a small state lying along the Baltic shore 
in Poland, east of the Vistula. It had been conquered by the 
valor of the Teutonic Knights in the thirteenth century, and dur- 
ing this and the following centuries had been gradually German- 
ized (sec. 154). 

521. The Great Elector Frederick William (i 640-1 688). 

Although this new Prussian power was destined to become the 
champion of German Protestantism, it acted a very unworthy and 
vacillating part in the Thirty Years' War. But just before the 
close of that struggle a strong man came to the throne, — Frederick 
William, better known as the " Great Elector." He infused vigor 
and strength into every department of the state and acquired 
such a position for his government that at the Peace of West- 
phalia he was able to secure new territory, which greatly enhanced 
his power and prominence among the German princes. 

The Great Elector ruled for nearly half a century, and. left to 
his successor a strongly centralized authority. He was one of the 

469 



470 THE RISE OF PRUSSIA 

most ideal representatives of the principle of absolute monarchy 
then so dominant. Like all absolute rulers, he placed his faith in 
soldiers, and laid the basis of the military power of Prussia by the 
creation of a standing army. . 

522 . How the Elector of Brandenburg acquired the Title of King. 
— Elector Frederick III (1688-1713), son of the Great Elector, 
was ambitious for the title of King, a dignity that the weight and 
influence won for the Prussian state by his father fairly justified 
him in seeking. He saw about him other princes less powerful 
than himself enjoying this dignity, and he too " would be a king 
and wear a crown." 

It was necessary of course for Frederick to secure the consent 
of the Emperor, a matter of some difficulty, for the Catholic 
advisers of the Austrian court were bitterly opposed to having an 
heretical prince thus honored and advanced. But the War of the 
Spanish Succession was just about to open, and the Emperor was 
extremely anxious to secure Frederick's assistance in the coming 
struggle. Therefore, on condition of his furnishing him aid in the 
war, the Emperor consented to Frederick's assuming the new title 
and dignity in the Duchy of Prussia, which, unlike Brandenburg, 
was not included in the Empire. Accordingly, early in the year 
1 70 1, Frederick, amidst imposing ceremonies, was crowned and 
hailed as King at Konigsberg. Hitherto- he had been Elector of 
Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia ; now he was Elector of Bran- 
denburg and King of Prussia. 

Thus was a new king born among the kings of Europe. Thus 
did the House of Hapsburg .invest with royal dignity the rival 
House of HohenzoUern. The event is a landmark in German, 
and even in European, history. The cue of German history from 
this on is the growth of the power of the Prussian kings and their 
steady advance to imperial honors and to the control of the 
affairs of the German race. 

523. Frederick William I (i 713-1740). — The son and suc- 
cessor of the first Prussian king, known as Frederick William I, 
was a most extraordinary character. He was a strong, violent, 
brutal man, full of the strangest freaks, yet in many respects just 



FREDERICK WILLIAM I 471 

the man for the times. He despised culture and treated scholars 
with studied contempt, being reported as having declared that 
*' a pinch of common sense was worth a university full of learning." 
He would tolerate no idlers. He carried a long cane, which he 
laid upon the back of every unoccupied person he chanced to 
meet, whether man, woman, or child. 

Frederick William had a mania for big soldiers. With infinite 
expense and trouble he gathered a regiment of the tallest men he 
could find, who were known as the " Potsdam Giants," — a regi- 
ment numbering twenty-four hundred men. Not only were the 
Goliaths of his own dominions impressed into the service, but tall 
men in all parts of Europe were coaxed and hired to join the 
regiment. No present was so acceptable to him as a tall grena- 
dier. The Princess Wilhelmina, referring to her father's ruling 
passion, says : " This regiment might justly be styled ' the chan- 
nel of royal favor,' for to give or to procure tall men for the king 
was sufficient to obtain anything of him." On the other hand, 
nothing angered him more than any interference with his recruit- 
ing service. To the Dutch, who had hanged two of his recruiting 
sergeants and then later wanted from Prussia a famous scholar for 
one of their universities, he is said to have replied curtly, " No 
tall fellows, no professor." 

Considering the trouble and expense Frederick William had in 
collecting his giants, the care which he took of them was quite 
natural. He looked after them as tenderly as though they were 
infants, and was very careful never to expose them to the dangers 
of a battle. 

Notwithstanding Frederick William was so eccentric in many 
of his public acts, and in his domestic relations was a perfect 
savage, in the general administration of his government he 
evinced such energy and good judgment that he is admitted to 
have been one of the greatest administrators of his age. He did 
very much to consolidate the power of Prussia, and at his death 
in 1740 left to his successor a considerably extended dominion 
and a splendidly drilled army which he had increased from thirty- 
five thousand to eighty thousand men. 



472 THE RISE OF PRUSSIA 

524. Accession of Frederick the Great (1740).; his Youth 

Frederick William was followed by his son Frederick II, more 
generally known as Frederick the Great. Like his father he was 
a soldier, but unlike him he was fond of music and literature and 
keenly interested in the economic welfare of his subjects. Around 
his name gather events of world-wide interest for forty-six years 
just preceding the French Revolution. 

It was a rough nurture Frederick had received in the home of 
his brutal father. His sister Wilhelmina tells incredible tales of 
her own and her brother's treatment at the hands of their savage 
parent. He made the palace a veritable hell for them both. He 
threw plates from the table at their heads and kept them in con- 
stant fear for their lives. Frederick's fine tastes for music and art 
and reading exposed him in particular, to use the words of Wil- 
helmina, to his royal father's "customary endearments with his 
fist and cane." 

Frederick had a genius for war, and his father had prepared to 
his hand one of the most efficient instruments of that art since 
the time of the Roman legions. "The Prussian battalion," says 
Frederick, speaking of the army he had inherited from his paren- 
tal drillmaster, " had become a walking battery." One Prussian, 
he asserts, was equal to three adversaries. 

The two great wars in which Frederick was engaged, and 
which raised Prussia to a rank among the great military powers 
of Europe, were the War of the Austrian Succession and the 
Seven Years' War. 

525. War of the Austrian Succession (i 740-1 748). — Through 
the death of Charles VI the imperial office became vacant in 
the very year that Frederick II ascended the Prussian throne. 
Charles was the last of the direct male line of the Hapsburgs, 
and disputes straightway arose respecting the succession to the 
dominions of the House of Austria, which resulted in the long 
struggle known as the War of the Austrian Succession. 

Now, not long before his death Charles had bound all the 
different states of his dominion and all the leading powers of 
Europe to a sort of agreement called the Pragmatic Sanction, by 







S PRUSSIA 

at tlie-AceessioiL of 

rREDEKICK THE (JKEAT 

ln..l?40 

q 50 100 



Scale of Miles 



SUA 




PRUSSIA 

a '^ at the Death of 

fkedekicb: the gkeat 

In 1~86 

()50100 
' Scate Of "Miles' 



WAR OF THE AUSTRIAN SUCCESSION 473 

the terms of which, in case he should leave no son, all his hered- 
itary dominions — that is, the kingdom of Hungary, the kingdom 
of Bohemia, the archduchy of Austria, and. the other possessions 
of the House of Austria — should descend to his elder daughter, 
Maria Theresa. Accordingly, upon the death of Charles these 
dominions passed to the archduchess, who was now called Queen 
of Hungary, that being the highest title of all those which she 
was entitled to bear.^ 

Solemnly as the powers of Europe had agreed to maintain the 
Pragmatic Sanction, no sooner was Charles dead than Bavaria, 
Spain, Sardinia, and Saxony each laid claim to all or to portions 
of the Hapsburg inheritance. France, quite willing to aid in the 
dismemberment of Austria, supported the pretensions of Bavaria. 
Before any of these claimants, however, had begun hostilities, 
Frederick, — whose father had guaranteed the Pragmatic Sanction, 
— without any declaration of war, marched his army into Silesia 
and took forcible possession of that country. Frederick's act was 
an act of pure brigandage. He himself frankly tells posterity 
that the mixed motive under which he acted was a desire to aug- 
ment his dominions, to render himself and Prussia respected in 
Europe, and to acquire fame. 

Thus stripped of one of her fairest provinces, Maria Theresa 
finally appealed to the Hungarian nobility to avenge her wrongs. 
They were at this time discontented because certain of their rights 
had not been respected. By restoring or confirming all their ancient 
liberties, the queen gained their ardent and loyal support. 

England, the Protestant Netherlands, and eventually Russia 
were drawn into the war as allies of Maria Theresa. The theater 
of the struggle came to embrace India and the French and Eng- 
lish colonies in the New World. Macaulay's well-known words 
picture the world-wide range of the conflagration which Freder- 
ick's act had kindled : " In order that he might rob a neighbor," 

1 The imperial crown could not of course be worn by her. This was given by the 
Electors to Charles Albert, Elector of Bavaria, who became Emperor Charles VII 
(1742). Three years later Charles died and the husband of Maria Theresa was raised 
by the Electors to the imperial throne as Emperor Francis 1. 



474 THE RISE OF PRUSSIA 

he says, " whom he had promised to defend, black men fought on 
the coast of Coromandel, and red men scalped each other by the 
Great Lakes of North America." 

The war went on until 1748, when it was closed by the Peace 
of Aix-la-Chapelle. Carlyle's summing up of the provisions of the 
various treaties of this peace can be easily remembered, and is 
not misleading as to the essentials : " To Frederick, Silesia ; as to 
the rest, wholly as they were." 

526. The Seven Years' War (1756-1763). — The eight years 
of peace which followed the War of the Austrian Succession were 
improved by Frederick in developing the resources of his king- 
dom and perfecting the organization and discipline of his army. 
During this time Maria Theresa was busy forming a league of the 
chief European powers against the unscrupulous despoiler of her 
dominions. Russia, Sweden, many of the states of the Germanic 
body, and even France, who now abandoned her traditional policy 
of opposition to the House of Austria, — all ultimately entered into 
an alliance with the empress queen. Frederick could at first find 
no ally save England,- — towards the close of the war Russia 
came for a short time to his side, — so that he was left almost 
alone to fight the combined armies of half the Continent.^ 
Throughout the struggle Prussia w^as scarcely more than a 
"Spartan camp." 

The long war is known in European history as the Seven Years' 
War. At the very outset it became mixed with what in American 
history is called the French and Indian War, which had practi- 
cally begun wdth the disastrous defeat of Braddock in 1755. 

At first the fortunes of the war were all on Frederick's side. 
In the celebrated battles of Rossbach, Leuthen, and Zorndorf he 
defeated successively the French, the Austrians, and the Russians. 
These successes revealed the fact that the armies of Prussia 
had at their head a commander whose very ability made him 
a dangerous force in Europe. His name became everywhere a 
household word, and everybody coupled with it the epithet of Great. 

2 The population of Prussia at this time was about 5,000,000 ; the aggregate popu- 
lation of the states leagued against her is estimated at 100,000,000. 



THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR 



475 



But fortune finally deserted him. In sustaining the unequal 
contest his dominions became drained of men; England with- 
drew her aid,^ and inevitable ruin seemed to impend over his 
throne and kingdom. He himself despaired of being able much 
longer to hold his enemies at bay, and carried about his person 
poison to use when the last 
effort should have been 
made. 

A change by death in the 
government of Russia now 
put a new face upon Fred- 
erick's affairs. In 1762 
Empress EHzabeth of that 
country died, and Peter III, 
an ardent admirer of Fred- 
erick, came to the throne, 
and immediately transferred 
the armies of Russia from 
the side of the allies to that 
of Prussia. "Together we 
will conquer the whole 
world," was the sanguine 
declaration of the Tsar as 
he joined his forces to those 
of his friend. 

The alliance lasted only 
a few months, Peter being 
deposed and murdered by 
his wife, who now came to 
the throne as Catherine II. 

She adopted a neutral poHcy and recalled her armies; but the 
temporary alliance had given Frederick a decisive advantage, and 
the year following the defection of Russia, England and France 
were glad to give over the struggle and sign the Peace of Paris 

8 William Pitt (later, Earl of Chatham) fell from power in 1761, and his policy of 
fighting France by helping Frederick was abandoned. Consult sec. 540. 




Fig. 85. — Maria Theresa 



4/6 THE RISE OF PRUSSIA 

(1763). Shortly after this another peace (the Treaty of Huberts- 
burg) was arranged between Austria and Prussia, and" one of the 
most terrible wars that had ever disturbed Europe was over. 
Silesia was left in the hands of Frederick. 

The Seven Years' War was one of the decisive combats of his- 
tory. Besides the Anglo-French question in India (sec. 540), it 
settled two questions of vast reach and significance. First, it 
settled, or at least put in the way of final settlement, the Austro- 
Prussian question, — the question as to whether Austria or Prussia 
should be leader in Germany. It made Prussia the equal of Aus- 
tria and foreshadowed her ascendancy. 

Second, it settled the Anglo-French question in America, a 
question like the Austro-Prussian question in Europe. It decided 
that North America should belong to the Protestant Anglo-Saxon, 
and not to the Catholic Latin, race. 

Thus, though the war was in no sense a religious war, still the 
outcome of the tremendous struggle was the humihation of two 
Catholic states, Austria and France, and the lifting into promi- 
nence of two Protestant states, Prussia and England. There was 
in this vast significance for both Old and New World history. 

527. Frederick rounds out his Dominions at the Expense of 
Poland. — It was about a decade after the close of the Seven 
Years' War that Frederick, as has already been related, joined 
with Catherine II of Russia and Maria Theresa of Austria in the 
First Partition of Poland (sec. 519). 

Respecting the value to Prussia of the territory she received 
in this transaction, Frederick in his History of my Own Times 
comments as follows : " This was one of the most important 
acquisitions we could possibly make, because it joined Pomerania 
and Eastern Prussia (see map, p. 472), and, by rendering us mas- 
ters of the Vistula, we gained the double advantage of being able 
to defend this kingdom and of levying very considerable tolls on 
the Vistula, the whole trade of Poland being carried on upon that 
river." But this aggrandizement of Prussia was secured only by 
just such a cynical disregard of international honesty by Frederick 
as marked his aimexation of Silesia. 



FREDERICK AS A RULER 477 

528. Frederick as an Enlightened Despot. — Frederick in all his 
relations to his own subjects had a wholly different moral stand- 
ard from that which he adopted in his dealings with his brother 
sovereigns. In all matters concerning foreign states, expediency 
was his only guide ; he did whatever he thought would aggrandize 
Prussia and glorify himself, without any regard to truth, honesty, 
or honor. But for his guidance in his relations to his own 
people he had a different code. Despotic though he always was, 
yet on the whole he made such use of his absolute power that 
he has been numbered among the enlightened despots of the 
eighteenth century. Professor Morse Stephens illustrates the dif- 
ference between the despotism of Louis XIV and that of Frederick 
by thus setting in contrast their respective maxims : " Louis said, 
' I am the State ' ; Frederick said, ' I am the first servant of the 
State.' " 

During the intervals of peace between his great wars, and for 
the half of his reign which followed the Peace of Hubertsburg, 
Frederick labored untiringly to develop the resources of his 
dominions and to promote the material welfare of his kingdom. 
He dug canals, constructed roads, drained marshes, encouraged 
agriculture and manufactures, and improved in every possible way 
the administration of the government. 

Yet in everything he did Frederick showed the true Hohenzollern 
spirit. He had no confidence in the ability or the intelligence of 
the common people and took no steps to educate or train them 
to be more useful citizens. On the contrary, he taught them to 
look to the government for all their well-being without expecting 
or even desiring to have any share in the government themselves. 
Even the nobility was not called on for much assistance, and the 
ministers did litde more than register the king's will. 

But Frederick's attention was not wholly engrossed with look- 
ing after the material well-being of his subjects. He was a philoso- 
pher and believed himself to be a poet, and usually spent several 
hours each day in philosophical and literary pursuits. It has been 
said of him that "he divided with Voltaire the intellectual mon- 
archy of the eighteenth century." He gathered about him a 



478 THE RISE OF PRUSSIA 

company selected from among the most distinguished authors, sci- 
entists, and philosophers of the age, among whom was his *' co- 
sovereign" Voltaire, whom Frederick coaxed to Berlin to add 
brilliancy to his court, and to criticise and correct his verses. 
Frederick felt very proud — for a time — of this acquisition, and 
rejoiced that to his other titles he could now add that of " the 
Possessor of Voltaire." But it was an ill-assorted friendship; the 
two " sovereigns " soon quarreled, and Voltaire was dismissed 
from court in disgrace. 

Frederick was a freethinker. His paganism made him indiffer- 
ent toward all religions, and hence tolerant. He said in effect, as 
Carlyle reports him, " In this country every man must get to 
heaven in his own way." The company which he gathered at 
Sans Souci, his favorite palace at Potsdam, near Berlin, was a 
most extraordinary collection of heretics, agnostics, misbelievers, 
and unbelievers. It was a company very representative of that 
learned literary and philosophical society of the eighteenth cen- 
tury whose ideas and teachings did so much to prepare the w^ay 
for the French Revolution. 

It was on the very eve of this great political and social upheaval 
that Frederick died, — in 1786. Carlyle calls him "the last of 
the kings." He was of course not the last in name. Only three 
years after he had been laid in the tomb broke out the revolution 
which closed the Age of the Kings and ushered in the Age of 
the People. 

529. Summary : Prussia made a New Center of German 
Crystallization. — This chapter may be summarized in this way. 
The all-important result of Frederick the Great's strong reign was 
the making of Prussia the equal of Austria, and thereby the lay- 
ing of the basis of future German unity. Hitherto Germany had 
been trying unsuccessfully to concentrate about Austria; now 
there was a new center of crystallization, — one which was destined 
to draw to itseK the Protestant elements of German nationality. 

The internal history of Germany from Frederick's reign on, if 
we leave out of consideration the period of Napoleon's domina- 
tion, is very largely the story of the rivalry of these two powers, 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 479 

resulting in the final triumph of Prussia and the unification of 
Germany under her leadership, Austria with the mixed races 
under her rule being pushed out as though entitled to no part 
in the affairs of the Empire. This story we shall tell in a 
later chapter. 

Selections from the Sources. — Memoirs of Frederica Sophia Wil- 
helmina (Margravine of Baireuth, sister of Frederick the Great). These 
memoirs form one of the most graphic and piquant autobiographies ever 
written. They hold striking portraits of the author's savage father, Fred- 
erick William I, of her brother, to whom she was devotedly attached, and 
of many other distinguished contemporaries. But Wilhelmina's lively 
imagination and her mischievous if not malicious spirit caused her to 
overcolor and to exaggerate. Consequently the numerous portraits which 
she delights in sketching, while always interesting and often amusing, are 
not to be taken too seriously. 

Secondary Works. — Tuttle, History of Prtcssia. This work was 
unhappily interrupted at the year 1757 by the death of the author. It 
is the best history in English of the period covered. Reddaway, Fred- 
erick the Great ajid the Rise of Prussia. Carlyle, History of Friedrich 
the Second. This is one of Carlyle's masterpieces. Like his French Revo- 
lution it will be best appreciated if read after some acquaintance with its 
subject has been gained from other sources. It deals almost exclusively 
with Frederick's twenty-three years of war and utterly neglects or mini- 
mizes the twenty-three of his reign which were years of peace. Hassall, 
The Balance of Power, lyi^-i'jSg, chaps, vi-ix. Longman, Frederick the 
Great and the Seven Years'' War. Bright, Maria Theresa. Henderson, 
A Short History of Germany, vol. ii, chaps, i-v. Macaulay, Essay on 
Frederick the Great. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Teutonic Knights and the begin- 
nings of Prussia. 2. The Great Elector Frederick William. 3. Character of 
the father of Frederick the Great. 4. The Regiment of Giants. 5. The 
Empress-Queen Maria Theresa. 6. Frederick the Great and Voltaire. 
7. Frederick the Great as an enlightened despot. 



CHAPTER XXXI 
EWGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

I. The Reign of Queen Anne (1702-17 14) 

530. The Formula for Eighteenth-Century English History. — 

" The expansion of England in the New World and in Asia," says 
Professor Seeley, " is the formula which sums up for England the 
history of the eighteenth century." 

This expansion movement was simply the continuation of a 
trade and commercial development which had begun in the 
sixteenth century, and which had shaped large sections of the 
history of England by bringing her into sharp rivalry first with 
Spain and then with the Dutch Netherlands. Before the close 
of the seventeenth century England had practically triumphed 
over both these commercial rivals. Her great and dangerous 
rival in the eighteenth century was France. "The whole period," 
says Seeley, referring to the period between 1688 and 18 15, 
" stands out as an age of gigantic rivalry between England and 
France, a kind of second Hundred Years' War." 

To indicate from the viewpoint of English history the chief 
episodes in this great struggle between the two rivals for suprem- 
acy in the commercial and colonial world will be our chief aim 
in the present chapter. We shall, however, in order to render 
more complete our sketch of this century of English history, 
touch upon some other matters of special interest and signifi- 
cance, though connected in no direct manner with the dominant 
movement of the period. 

531. War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714). — The 
War of the Spanish Succession covered the whole of the reign 
of Queen Anne. Respecting the causes and results of this war, 

480 



WAR OF THE SPANISH SUCCESSION 4^1 

and of England's part in it, we have already spoken in connection 
with the reign of Louis XIV (sec. 451). Of what was there said 
we need here recall only the enumeration of the territorial gains 
which the war, and the Peace of Utrecht which closed it, brought 
to England ; namely, Gibraltar and the island of Minorca in the 
Old World, and Nova Scotia together with a clear title to New- 
foundland and the Hudson Bay Territory in the New. 

Of special interest in the present connection is that clause of 
the treaty between England and Spain whereby England took 
away from the French and secured for English merchants the 
contract known as the "Assiento," which gave English subjects 
the sole right for thirty years of shipping annually forty- eight 
hundred African slaves to the Spanish colonies in America.^ 
This slave trade was as lucrative a trafific as the old spice trade, 
and at this time was some such object of rivalry among the com- 
mercial states of Europe as that had formerly been. The secur- 
ing of this contract by England made her the chief slave-trading 
power in the world. 

At the same time that England got the Assiento contract she 
secured from Spain the further right to send each year one vessel 
on a trading voyage to Spanish America. 

Thus as results of the first war of the eighteenth century Enjg- 
land had got practical control of the Mediterranean, had secured 
a monopoly of the lucrative slave trade with the Spanish colonies, 
had made a beginning of wresting from France her possessions in 
the New World, and had gained mastery of the seas. " Before 
the war," says Mahan, " England was one of the sea powers ; 
after it she was the sea power, without any second." 

532. Parliamentary Union of England and Scotland (1707). — 
The most noteworthy matter in the domestic history of England 
during the reign of Queen Anne was the union of the Parliaments 

1 The Papal Line of Demarcation (sec. 307) and treaty engagements with the 
Portuguese shut the Spaniards out from Africa, and hence they had to depend upon 
intermediaries to fetch them slaves from thence. The Dutch had had the contract 
before the French. For an account of the Assiento and the economic condition at this 
time of Spanish America, see Moses, Establishment of Spanish Rule in America^ 
chap. xi. 



482 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

of England and Scotland.^ This important transaction was closely 
connected with that commercial and colonial expansion movement 
which characterized eighteenth-century English history. 

At this time England, dealing with Scotland in the same spirit 
as she dealt with Ireland, by means of navigation laws and high 
customs duties practically excluded her merchants, as though 
Scotland were a foreign state, from participation in that com- 
mercial prosperity which English traders were enjoying. The 
Scotch traders were shut out not only from the English colonies 
but also from the English home market. Scotch trade was thus 
strangled. In the hope of creating an outlet for their commerce, 
the Scots undertook to establish a colony of their own on the 
Isthmus of Panama, or Darien, which was given the name of 
New Caledonia.^ The settlement was to be the halfway station 
between Scotland and the East Indies. The enterprise raised 
great expectations. The isthmian city was to be the Alexandria 
of the New World, "the key of the universe."^ But the spot 
selected for the settlement proved unhealthy ; besides, the Span- 
iards made trouble and drove out the colonists, claiming that 
the settlement was an encroachment upon their territory. The 
outcome was the disastrous failure of the undertaking. 

The commercial distress occasioned in Scotland by reason of 
the miscarriage of this enterprise caused the feeling against Eng- 
land to become more intense than ever, and there were threats 
of breaking the dynastic ties which united the two countries. 
The English government, realizing the danger which lurked in 
the situation, — for the national sentiment in Scotland was still 
strong, — now met the Scots in a spirit of reasonable compro- 
mise. It was agreed that the Parliaments of the two countries 
should be united; that perfect free trade should be established 
between them ; and that all the English colonies should be open 

2 It was only the crowns of the two kingdoms which were united upon the acces- 
sion of the House of Stuart to the EngUsh throne in 1603 (sec. 458). 

3 The promoter of the project was a Scotchman named William Paterson. The 
active efforts to found the colony covered the years 1698-1700, 

4 The scheme, it will be noted, was substantially only an anticipation of the later 
unfortunate French Panama Canal project c 



LITERATURE UNDER QUEEN ANNE 483 

to Scotch traders. On this basis was brought about the union of 
the two realms into a single kingdom under the name of Great 
Britain (1707). From this time forward the two countries were 
represented by one Parliament sitting at Westminster. 

The union was advantageous to both countries; for it was a 
union not simply of hands but of hearts. England's constant 
and costly watch of her northern frontiers through ten centuries 
against raid and invasion could now be intermitted. As to Scot- 
land, her entrance into England's home and colonial markets, 
and her participation in English manufacturing and commercial 
enterprises, resulted in a wonderful expansion of her energies 
and resources. Manufactories sprang up on every side; insig- 
nificant hamlets grew quickly into great centers of industry. Ten 
years after the union the first Scotch vessel intended for the 
transatlantic trade was launched on the Clyde. The Clyde to-day 
is one of the greatest centers of the shipbuilding industry, and 
Glasgow is one of the largest and most important seaports of 
the world. 

533. Literature under Queen Anne. — The reign of Queen Anne 
was an illustrious one in English literature. Under her began to 
write a group of brilHant authors whose activity continued on 
into the reign of her successor, George I. Their productions are, 
many of them, of special interest to the historian, because during 
this period there was an unusually close connection between liter- 
ature and politics. Literature was forced into the service of 
party. A large portion of the writings of the era was in the form 
of political pamphlets, wherein all the resources of wit, satire, and 
literary skill were exhausted in defending or ridiculing the oppos- 
ing principles and policies of Whig and Tory. 

The four most prominent and representative authors of 
the times were Alexander Pope (1688-1744), Jonathan Swift 
(1667-1745), Joseph Addison (i 672-1 719), and Daniel Defoe 
(i66i?-i73i). 

In the scientific annals of the period the name of Sir Isaac 
Newton (1642-17 2 7) is most prominent. As the discoverer of 
the law of gravitation and the author of the Principia^ his name 



484 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

will ever retain a high place among the few who belong through 
their genius or achievements to no single nation or age, but to 
the world. 

534. Death of Queen Anne; the Succession. — Queen Anne 
died in the year 1 7 1 4, leaving no heirs. In the reign of William 
a statute known as the Act of Settlement had provided that the 
crown, in default of heirs of WiUiam and Anne, should descend 
to the Elec tress Sophia of Hanover (grandchild of James I), or 
her heirs, " being Protestants." The Electress died only a short 
time before the death of Queen Anne ; so, upon that event, the 
crown passed to the Electress' eldest son, George, who thus 
became the founder of a new line of English sovereigns, the 
House of Hanover, or Brunswick, the family in whose hands the 
royal scepter still remains. 

11. England under the Earlier Hanoverians^ 

535. The Sovereign's Loss of Political Influence ; the Prime 
Minister and the ^Cabinet. — The new Hanoverian king, George I 
(17 1 4-1 7 2 7), was utterly ignorant of the language and the affairs 
of the people over whom he had been called to rule. He was not 
loved by the English, but he was tolerated by them for the reason 
that he represented Protestantism and those principles of political 
liberty for which they had so long battled with their Stuart kings. 
On account of his ignorance of English affairs the king was 
obliged to intrust to his ministers the practical administration of 
the government. The same was true in the case of George II 
(1727-1760). George III (1760-1820), having been born and 
educated in England, regained some of the old influence of 
former kings. But he was the last English sovereign who had 
any large personal influence in shaping governmental policies. 

The power and patronage lost by the crown passed into the 
hands of the chief minister, popularly called the Prime Minister, 

5 The sovereigns of the House of Hanover are George I (1714-1727), George II 
(1727-1760), George III (1760-1820), George IV (1820-1830), William IV (1830- 
1837), Victoria (1837-1901), Edward VII (1901-1910), and George V (1910- ). 



THE PRIME MINISTER AND CABINET 485 

or Premier, whose tenure of office was dependent not upon the 
good will of the sovereign but upon the support of the House of 
Commons. This transfer of power was not made all at once, but 
by the middle- of the eighteenth century it was practically com- 
pleted, although this fact was not always gracefully and promptly 
recognized by the crown. In the EngHsh government of to-day 
the Prime Minister is the actual and fully acknowledged execu- 
tive. The king remains the titular sovereign, indeed, but all real 
power and patronage are in the hands of the Premier. 

The first EngHsh Prime Minister in the modem sense was Sir 
Robert Walpole. He did not exercise all the functions of the 
Premier of to-day, but his control of affairs and his relation to the 
dominant party in Parliament were such that to give him this name 
is not misleading. He was at the head of the government, as the 
leader of the Whig party, for about twenty-one years (i 7 2 i-i 742). 
He maintained a favorable majority in Parliament by gifts of office, 
titles, pensions, and, it is charged, by the grossly corrupt use of 
the immense secret-service funds of which he had the disposal.® 

It was during the administration of Sir Robert Walpole that 
what is known as the Cabinet assumed substantially the form 
which it has at the present time. This body is practically a com- 
mittee composed of a dozen or more members of Parliament, 
headed by the Prime Minister, and dependent for its existence 
upon the will of the House of Commons. The Premier and his 
colleagues stand and fall together. When the Cabinet can no 
longer command a majority in the Commons, its members resign, 
and a new Prime Minister, appointed nominally by the sovereign, 
but . really by the party in control of the House of Commons, 
forms a new Cabinet."^ 

536. "The South Sea Bubble" (i 720-1 721). — One of the 
earUest matters of moment of the Hanoverian period was a 

6 To him has been attributed the cynical saying, " Every man has his price." But 
he did not utter this " famous slander on mankind." What he actually did say was, 
" All these men have their price," — referring to a group of his opponents. See Mor- 
ley, Walpole, p. 127 ; and Lecky, England in the Eighteenth Century, vol. i, p. 399. 

7 The Cabinet is an essential feature of all modern self-governing states which have 
constitutions copied after the parliamentary system developed by the English. 



4S6 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

financial episode very like that connected with the name of John 
Law in French history (sec. 457). The affair grew directly out of 
the treaty arrangements which closed the War of the Spanish Suc- 
cession. As we have seen, England then secured certain trading 
privileges with the Spanish colonies. Now, at this time there 
were abroad most exaggerated ideas of the wealth of Spanish 
America, and it was conceived that trading privileges in those 
parts meant unlimited wealth for everybody sharing them. In 
anticipation of the treaty there was formed in England a com- 
pany to engage in trade with the Spanish colonies. The shares 
of the company were eagerly sought after, and soon began to rise 
in price like the shares of the famous French Mississippi Com- 
pany. Other projects were started, and a perfect mania for specu- 
lation developed. The outcome could of course have been fore- 
seen. The bubble collapsed, and to the melancholy record of "the 
Mississippi Bubble" was added that of "the South Sea Bubble." 

537. The "War of the Austrian Succession (i 740-1 748). — 
From our present viewpoint we can easily see what was Eng- 
land's main interest in the War of the Austrian Succession (sec. 
525). She entered the struggle on the side of Austria especially 
in order to thwart France in the two ambitious objects which 
she was then pursuing, namely, to make herself arbiter of Europe 
through the dismemberment of the Austrian monarchy, and to gain 
supremacy on the sea and in the colonial world. 

The French- English phase of the war was in the main a naval 
combat. The outcome was the practical destruction of the French 
navy and the firmer establishment of England's sea power. The 
relations of the two rivals in India and in America were left essen- 
tially unchanged,^ yet England's confirmed mastery of the sea 
foreshadowed the disastrous issue for France of the next conflict, 
which was only a little way in the future. 

538. The "Young Pretender"; the Last Rally of the Jacobites 
(1745).-— Several times during the earlier half of the eighteenth 

8 In India the French had taken Madras from the English, while in America the 
English had taken Louisburg in Cape Breton from the French. There was a mutual 
restoration of conquests at the end of the war. 



THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL 487 

century, the exiled Stuarts attempted to get back the throne they 
had lost. The last of these attempts was made in 1745, when 
the "Young Pretender" (grandson of James II), taking advan- 
tage of English reverses on the- Continent, landed in Scotland, 
effected a rising of the Scotch Highlanders, worsted the English 
at Prestonpans, and marched upon London. Forced to retreat 
into Scotland, he was pursued by the English and defeated at the 
battle of Culloden Moor, and the Stuart cause was ruined forever. 

539. The Religious Revival ; the Rise of Methodism. — It will 
be well for us here, midway in the century, to turn aside from the 
political affairs of England and cast a glance upon the religious 
life of the time. 

In its spiritual and moral Hfe the England of the earlier Han- 
overians was the England of the restored Stuarts. The nation 
was still under the influence of its reaction from the Puritan 
regime — the hated rule of the "Saints." Among the higher 
classes there was widespread infidelity ; religion was a matter of 
jest and open scoff. The Church was dead; the higher clergy 
were neglectful of their duties ; sermons were cold and formal 
essays. The lower classes were stolid, callous, and brutal. Drunk- 
enness was almost universal among high and low. The nation 
was immersed in material pursuits, and was without thought or 
care for things ideal and spiritual. 

Such a state of things in society as this has never failed to 
awaken in select souls a vehement protest. And it was so now. 
At Oxford, about the year 1730, a number of earnest young men, 
among whom we find John and Charles Wesley and George White- 
field, formed a little society, the object of which was mutual help- 
fulness in true Christian living. From their strict and methodical 
manner of Hfe they were derisively nicknamed " Methodists." 

This Oxford movement was the starting point of a remarkable 
religious revival. John Wesley was the organizer, Whitefield the 
orator, and Charles Wesley the poet of the movement.^ They 
and their helpers reached the neglected masses through open-air 

9 Charles Wesley wrote over six thousand hymns, many of which are stilj favorites 
in the hymnals of to-day. 



488 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 



meetings. They preached in the fields, at the street comers, 
beneath the trees, at the great mining camps. The effects of 
their fervid exhortations were often as startHng as were those 
of the appeals of the preachers of the Crusades. 

The leaders of the revival at first had no thought of estab- 
lishing a Church distinct from the Anglican, but simply aimed 
at forming within the Established Church a society of earnest, 

devout workers, some- 
what like that of the 
Christian Endeavor 
societies in our present 
churches. Their enthu- 
siasm and their often 
extravagant manners, 
however, offended the 
staid, cold conservatism 
of the regular clergy, 
and they were finally 
constrained by petty 
persecution to go out 
from the established 
organization and form a 
Church of their own. 

The revival, like the 
Puritan movement of 
the seventeenth century, 
left a deep impress upon 
the life of England. It 
is due largely to this movement that in true religious feeling, in 
social purity, in moral earnestness, in humanitarian sentiment,^** 
the England of to-day is separated by such a gulf from the 
England of the first t\vo Georges. 

540. The Seven Years* War (1756-1763). — Just after the 
middle of the century there broke out between the French and 
the English colonists in America the so-called French and Indian 

10 Cf . sec. 543. 




Fig. 86.. — John Wesley. (After a 
painting by G. Romney) 



THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR 



489 



War. This struggle became blended with what in Europe is 
known as the Seven Years' War (sec. 526), and consequently it 
is from the viewpoint both of Europe and of America that we 
must regard it. 

At first the war went, disastrously against the English, — Brad- 
dock's expedition against Fort Duquesne, upon the march to 
which he suffered his memorable defeat in the wilderness, being 
but one of several 
ill-starred English 
undertakings.^^ In 
the Old World 
Minorca had been 
lost, and with it vir- 
tually the control of 
the Mediterranean. 
Never were Eng- 
lishmen cast into 
deeper despair. 
Never had they so 
completely lost 
faith in themselves. 
The Earl of Ches- 
terfield wrote : "We 
are undone both at 
home and abroad. 
. . . We are no 
longer a nation." 

The gloom was at 
its deepest when the elder William Pitt (later Earl of Chatham), 
known as " the Great Commoner," came to the head of affairs in 
England. Pitt was one of the greatest men the English race has 
ever produced. Frederick the Great expressed his estimate of 
him in these words : *' England has at la^st brought forth a man." 
Pitt's estimate of himself was equally high : ''I believe that I can 




Fig. 87. — William Pitt, Earl of Chatham 
(After a portrait by R. Brompton) 



11 Braddock's defeat occurred in 1755, before the formal declaration of war by 
either party. 



490 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

save this country and that no one else can," was the way in which 
he expressed his belief in his ability to retrieve past misfortunes. 

Pitt exercised the full authority of Prime Minister — though 
he was not the nominal head of the ministry — from 1757 to 
1 76 1. These were great years in Enghsh history. It was like 
a return of Cromwell's rule. Pitt's indomitable will and tireless 
energy pervaded at once every department of the government. 
"No person," it was said, ''ever entered his closet who did not 
come out of it a braver man." Incompetent men who had 
received appointments in the army and the navy solely on social 
grounds or through political influence were replaced by men of 
capacity, men upon whom Pitt could rely to carry out his plans. 

The war against France was pushed not only in America and 
upon the sea, but also in India and upon the Continent. Many 
disapproved of Pitt's policy of fighting France by aiding Fred- 
erick, but this opposition to his measures only called out Pitt's 
memorable declaration that he would conquer America in Germany. 

The turning point in the war, so far as America was concerned, 
was the great victory gained by the Enghsh under the youthful 
Major General Wolfe over the French under Montcalm on the 
Heights of Quebec (1759). The victory gave England Quebec, 
the key to the situation in the New World. 

In India also victory was declaring for the English in their 
struggle there with the French and their native alHes.^^ Two 
years before the battle of Quebec, Colonel Robert Clive, an 
ofhcer in the employ of the English East India Company, with 
eleven hundred English soldiers and two thousand sepoys,^^ in 
the memorable battle of Plassey (1757) had put to flight a native 
army of sixty thousand foot and horse, and had thus virtually 
laid, in the northeastern region -of the peninsula, the basis of 
England's great Indian Empire.^* 

12 The situation here was somewhat similar to that in the New World. Both the 
French and the English had been long on the ground, but merely as traders, and not 
as builders of empires. About the middle of the eighteenth century, however, they 
began to conquer the country and to lay the foundations of territorial dominion. 

13 The name given native soldiers in European employ. 

14 The prelude to this battle was a terrible crime committed by Siraj-ud-Daula, 
viceroy of Bengal and other provinces. Moved by anger at the refusal of the English 



THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 491 

The end came in 1763 with the Peace of Paris. France ceded 
to England Canada and all her possessions in North America east 
of the Mississippi River, save New Orleans and a little adjoining 
land (which, along with the French territory west of the Missis- 
sippi, had already been given to Spain), and two little islands in 
the neighborhood of Newfoundland, which she was allowed to 
retain to dry fish on. She also withdrew from India as a political 
rival of England. ^^ England's supremacy in the colonial world 
and her mastery of the sea were now firmly established. This 
position, notwithstanding severe losses of which we shall speak 
immediately, she has maintained up to the present day. 

541. The American Revolution (i 775-1 783). — The French 
and Indian War was the prelude to the War of American Inde- 
pendence. The overthrow of the French power in America made 
the English colonists less dependent than hitherto upon the 
mother country, since this removed their only dangerous rival 
and enemy on the continent. Clear-sighted statesmen had pre- 
dicted that when the colonists no longer needed England's help 
against the French they would sever the bonds uniting them to 
the home land, if at any time these bonds chafed them. 

And very soon the bonds did chafe. A majority in Parliament, 
thinking that the colonists should help pay the expenses of colo- 
nial defense, insisted upon taxing them. The colonists maintained 
that they could be justly taxed only through their own legislative 
assembUes. The British government refusing to acknowledge this 
principle, the colonists took up arms in defense of those rights 
and liberties which their fathers had won with so hard a struggle 
from English kings on English soil. 

official to surrender certain fugitives, and urged on by French agents, the viceroy- 
attacked the Enghsh fort and factory at Calcutta, and having secured one hundred 
and forty-six prisoners, thrust them into a contracted guardroom which was provided 
with only two small grated windows, — what in the story of India is known as "the 
Black Hole of Calcutta." During the course of a sultry night all but twenty-three 
of the unfortunate prisoners died of suffocation. It was in response to the cry which 
arose for vengeance that Robert Clive was sent by the English officials at Madras to 
succor Bengal. 

15 Pondicherry, a French trading post on the eastern coast of India, was restored 
to France, and she still remained in the peninsula as a trader ; but her polUical power 
was as completely broken, there by the war as in America. 



492 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

France seized the opportunity presented by the war to avenge 
herself upon England for the loss of Canada/^ and gave aid to 
the colonists. Spain and Holland also were both drawn into the 
struggle, fighting against their old-time rival and foe. 

The war was ended by the Peace of Paris (1783). England 
acknowledged the independence of the thirteen colonies, — and 
a Greater England began its separate career in the New World. 
At the same time England was constrained to restore or to cede 
various islands and territories to France and to Spain. The 
magnificent empire with which she had emerged from the Seven 
Years' War seemed shattered and ruined beyond recovery. Not 
only England's enemies but many Englishmen themselves believed 
that her days of imperial rule were ended. 

But there were yet left to England Canada and India; and 
only recently Australia had come into her possession (sec. 734). 
And then England was yet mistress of the seas ; her commercial 
supremacy remained unshaken. There were elements here which 
might become factors of a new empire greater than the one which 
had been lost. But no Englishman standing in the gloom of the 
year 1783 could look far enough into the future to foresee the 
greatness and splendor of England's second empire which was to 
rise out of the ruins of the first. 

542. Legislative Independence of Ireland (1782). — While the 
War of American Independence was going on, the Irish, taking 
advantage of the embarrassment of the English government, 
demanded legislative independence. Since the Norman period 
Ireland had had a Parliament of her own, but it was depend- 
ent upon the English crown, and at this time was subordinate to 
the EngUsh Parliament, which asserted and exercised the right 
to bind Ireland by its laws. This the Anglo-Irish patriots strenu- 
ously resisted and drew up a Declaration of Rights wherein they 
demanded the legislative independence of Ireland. Fear of a 
revolt led England to grant the demands of the patriots and 
acknowledge the independence of the Irish Parliament (1782). 

16 There were other and more admirable motives animating many of the individual 
Frenchmen who, like Lafayette, fought on the side of the American patriots (sec. 560). 



ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE 493 

543. The Abolition of the Slave Trade. — Intimately connected 
with the great religious revival led by the Wesleys and Whitefield 
were certain philanthropic movements which hold a prominent 
place in the history of the moral and social life not only of Eng- 
land but of humanity. The most noteworthy of these was that 
resulting in the abolition of the African slave trade. 

We have noticed how at the opening of the eighteenth century 
England secured from Spain the contract for providing her Amer- 
ican colonies with negro slaves (sec. 531). There was then Httle 
or no moral disapproval of this iniquitous traffic. But one effect 
of the religious revival was the calling into existence of much 
genuine philanthropic feeling. This sentiment expressed itself in 
a movement for the abolition of the inhuman trade. 

The leaders of the movement were Thomas Clarkson (1760— 
1846) and William Wilberforce (175 9-1833). The terrible dis- 
closures which were made of the atrocious cruelty of the slave 
dealers stirred the public indignation and awakened the national 
conscience. Finally, in 1807, after twenty years of agitation, a 
law was passed aboHshing the trade.^^ This signaled as great 
a moral victory as ever was won in the English Parliament, for it 
was the aroused moral sentiment of the nation which was the main 
force that carried the reform measure through the Houses.^^ 

544. The Industrial Revolution. — We turn now from the 
poHtical, religious,- and moral realms to the industrial domain. 
In this sphere of English life the latter part of the eighteenth 
century witnessed a wonderful revolution. It was England's 
commercial supremacy which had prepared the way for the great 
industrial development. The outward movement had created a 
world-wide market for English goods. She had become "the 



17 England had been anticipated by Denmark in the condemnation of the slave 
trade. That country had abolished the traffic in 1802. In the United States the 
importation of slaves was illegal after 1808. Before 1820 most civilized states had 
placed the trade under the ban. 

18 Another important humanitarian movement of the century was that of prison 
reform. This was effected chiefly through the labors of a single person, the philan- 
thropist John Howard (i 726-1 790), who devoted his life to effecting a reform in 
prison conditions and discipline. 



494 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

workshop of the world." Naturally manufactures were encour- 
aged, and inventive genius and ingenuity stimulated to the utmost 
in devising improved processes in the industrial arts. The result 
was an industrial revolution such as the centuries known to his- 
tory had never witnessed before. 

In order that we may get the right point of view here and be 
able to appreciate the importance of the industrial revolution 
of which we speak, it is necessary that we should first note the 
remarkable fact that while civilization during historic times had 
made great advances on many lines and in many domains, in 
the industrial realm it had remained almost stationary from the 
dawn of history. At the middle of the eighteenth century all the 
industrial arts were being carried on in practically the same way 
that they were followed six or seven thousand years before in 
ancient Egypt and Babylonia. 

Suddenly all this was changed by a few inventions. About 1767 
Hargreaves invented the spinning jenny. From the beginning 
of history, indeed from a period lost in the obscurity of prehistoric 
times, all the thread used in weaving had been made by twisting 
each thread separately. The spinning jenny, when perfected,-^^ 
with a single attendant twisted hundreds of threads at once. 
Within twenty years from the time of this invention there were 
between four and five million spindles in use in England. 

It was now possible to produce thread in unhmited quantities. 
The next thing needed was improved machinery for weaving it 
into cloth. This was soon provided by Cartwright's power loom 
(1785). The next requisite was motive power to run the new 
machinery. At just this time James Watt brought out his inven- 
tion, or rather improvement, of the steam engine (1785). In its 
ruder form it had been used in the mines ; now it was introduced 
into the factories. 

The primary forces of the great industrial revolution — the 
spinning jenny, the power loom, and the steam engine — were 
now at work. The application of the steam engine to transporta- 
tion purposes gave the world the steam railroad and the steamship. 
19 It was perfected by Arkwright and Crompton by 1779. 



THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 495 

These inventions and discoveries in the industrial realm mark 
an epoch in the history of civilization. We have to go back to 
prehistoric times to find in this domain any inventions or dis- 
coveries like them in their import for human progress. There is 
nothing between Menes in Egypt and George III in England 
with which to compare them. The discovery of fire, the invention 

of metal tools, and the domestication of animals and plants,^^ 

these inventions and achievements of prehistoric man are alone 
worthy, in their transforming effect upon human society, of being 
placed alongside them. 

545. Import to England of the Industrial Revolution. — In the 
present connection we can note the bearing of the great industrial 
revolution upon only one episode in the general historical move- 
ment. It exerted a determining influence upon the course and 
issue of the great French Revolution and of the Napoleonic Wars 
which grew out of it. It armed England for the great fight, and 
enabled her to play the important part she did in that period of 
titanic struggle. " It is our improved steam engine," says Lord 
Jeffrey in his eulogy of Watt (written in 1819), " which has fought 
the battles of Europe and exalted and sustained through the late 
tremendous contest the pohtical greatness of our land." It was 
the steam engine which created the wealth which England used 
so lavishly in carrying on the fight against Napoleon, and which 
did more perhaps than any other force in giving direction to the 
course of events during the years of his domination. 

546. Conclusion. — With the French Revolution we reach a 
period in which English history must be regarded from the view- 
point of France. Indeed, for the space of half a generation after 
the rise of Napoleon to power, all European history becomes 
largely biographical and centers about that unique personality. 
Consequently we shall drop the story of English history at this 
point and let it blend with the story of the Revolution and that 
of the Napoleonic Empire. 

All that we need here notice is that the Napoleonic Wars, in 
their Anglo-French phase, were essentially a continuation — and 

*> See Ancient History, sees, 8-10. 



496 ENGLAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 

the end — of the second Hundred Years' War between England 
and France. Napoleon, having seized supreme power in France, 
endeavored to destroy England's commercial supremacy and to 
regain for France that position in the colonial world from which 
she had been thrust by England. But this tremendous struggle, 
like all the others in which England had engaged with her ancient 
foe, — save the one in which she lost her American colonies, — 
only resulted, as we shall see later, in bringing into her hands 
additional colonial possessions, and in placing her naval power 
and commercial supremacy on a firmer basis than ever before. 



Selections from the Sources. — Henderson, Side Lights on English 
History^ pp. 214-283 ; Kendall, Source-Book, chaps, xvi-xviii, particularly 
Extract No. 1 1 1, '" A View of Ireland in the Eighteenth Century," by Swift ; 
Adams and Stephens, Select Documents of English Constitutional History, 
pp. 475-506 ; and Hill, Liberty Documents, chaps, xi and xii. For the slave 
trade, see Clarkson, The History of the Rise, Progress, and Accomplish- 
ment of the Abolition of the Slave Trade by the British Parliament. Clark- 
son was himself a main instrument in bringing about the great reform. 

Secondary Works. — For the most suggestive short work on the period 
turn to Seeley, The Expansion of England. Written on somewhat similar 
lines is Caldecott, English Colonization and Empire, chaps, iii-v. Lecky, 
History of England in the Eighteenth Century, is the best comprehensive 
work. Morris, The Age of Queen Anne. For the naval history of the period, 
see Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power upon History, chaps, v-xiv. 

Biographies: Morley, Walpole ; Southey, Life of Wesley; Green, 
William Pitt, Earl of Chatham ; Macaulay, Essays on Horace Walpole, 
the Earl of Chatham (two essays). Lord Clive, and Warren Hastings. 

For the growth of the English Cabinet: Blauvelt, The Development 
of Cabinet Government in England ; and Jenks, Parliamentary England. 
For the rise of Methodism: Overton, The Evangelical Revival in the 
Eighteenth Century. For the French and English in America: Fiske, 
New England and New Eraftce, chaps, vii-x; and Parkman, Montcalm 
and Wolfe. For the conflict between England and her American colonies : 
Lecky, The American Revolution (ed. by James Albert Woodbum). For 
the English in India: Lyall, The Rise of the British Dominion in India. 
For industrial and Social England: Cheyney, An Introduction to the 
Industrial and Social History of England, chap. viii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The "Assiento" and the slave trade 
in the seventeenth century. 2. The Scotch project of a Panama colony. 
3. The EngUsh Cabinet. 4. The South Sea Bubble. 5. John Wesley. 
6. The abolition of the slave trade. 7. John Howard and prison reform. 



CHAPTER XXXII 

AUSTRIA UNDER THE BENEVOLENT DESPOT, EMPEROR 
JOSEPH II (1780-1790) 

547. Emperor Joseph II's Ideal and Aim. — Most worthy of 
remembrance among the royal contemporaries of Frederick the 
Great was Emperor Joseph II, the son of the Empress-Queen 
Maria Theresa. He became Emperor in 1765, and upon the 
death of his mother in 1780 succeeded to the sovereignty of the 
Austrian dominions. He was the best, though not the greatest, 
of the enlightened despots. 

Joseph II's aim was to make of the Austrian dominions an 
ideal state. This, in his conception, was a state possessing geo- 
graphical and moral unity; that is to say, a state with well- 
rounded scientific frontiers, with all power concentrated in the 
hands of the sovereign, with all its provinces ruled alike, and 
with all its inhabitants using the same language and having the 
same ideas, customs, and aspirations. 

548. His Reforms. — Now the Austrian monarchy was, and 
still is, just the opposite of all this. Joseph's endeavor was to 
make it like France, compact geographically, and homogeneous 
in language and customs. He wiped out many of the old divi- 
sions bas'ed on race, language, and historical antecedents, and in 
the interest of uniformity and simplicity of administration divided 
a great part of the monarchy into thirteen provinces, and each of 
these again into smaller subdivisions called circles. He abolished 
serfdom in several of his states. He closed over two thousand 
monasteries and devoted their property to the establishment of 
colleges, hospitals, and other public institutions. He issued a 
celebrated Edict of Toleration (1781), giving to all Christian sects 
equality of rights and privileges. He provided the cities of his 

497 



498 AUSTRIA UNDER JOSEPH II 

dominions with schools in which all the pupils were taught exactly 
the same lessons in exactly the same way. He founded libraries 
and encouraged research. He softened the harsh punishments of 
the mediaeval criminal code, and made the laws to conform to rea- 
son. He fostered manufactures, and by his own laborious life — 
he is said to have worked more hours each day than any other 
man in his dominions — set an example of industry to his subjects. 

549. His Dealings with the Low Countries and with Hungary. 

— In the furtherance of his plans, Joseph attempted to reduce 
the Low Countries, which constituted almost an independent state 
loosely united to Austria, to the condition of an administrative 
province of the Austrian monarchy. He disregarded the constitu- 
tion, laws, and customs of the provinces, interfered with the 
religion of the people, and substituted for the existing system of 
education a new system conforming to his own ideas of what 
should be taught the youth. Angered by all this meddling with 
their affairs, the Netherlanders rose in open revolt and declared 
themselves independent of the Austrian crown (1790). 

At the same time Joseph drove his Hungarian subjects to the 
verge of rebellion by attempting to deal with Hungary in some 
such arbitrary way as he had dealt with the Netherlands, — in a 
word, to Germanize the country. The situation became so threat- 
ening that Joseph, upon his dying bed, was constrained to annul 
all his reform measures and put everything back as it was, save as 
regards the serfs, who retained the freedom with which he had 
dowered them. 

550. Causes of the Failure of Joseph II' s Attempted Reforms. 

— The Emperor Joseph II is one of the most pathetic figures in 
history. He died in 1790, a weary, heartbroken man, lamenting 
that though he had labored his life through to make his subjects 
contented and happy and to deserve their love, he had simply 
filled his empire with unrest and unhappiness, and instead of 
winning the gratitude of his subjects had awakened only their 
ingratitude. 

The most of Joseph's attempted reforms, save those of the 
abolition of serfdom and the revision of the laws, had in truth 




m^ r^ 



BENEVOLENT DESPOTISM 499 

resulted in dismal failures. This was not because what he aimed 
to do was not in sad need of being done, but because in such 
matters the good intention is not sufficient without patience and 
wisdom. Joseph had neither. His lack of patience to wait for 
results is well shown in his method of creating a park : at great 
expense he set out full-grown trees instead of saplings. 

And Joseph lacked that wisdom which recognizes that the 
reformer must take account of the beliefs, habits, and prejudices 
of men and of races. As his biographer Paganel comments, " It 
is only in the hands of God that man is as clay." 

551. Reform from above versus Reform from below. — Joseph 
II was one of the last of the benevolent despots. Europe owes 
much to them. Some of their reforms were permanent and effected 
great ameHoration in the condition of the people in several of 
the countries of the Continent. But the enlightened despots 
were hampered in their work through being despots. Their 
theory of government shut out the people from all participation 
in the work of reform. But all true reform must proceed from 
below and not from above. As Buckle in his History of Civiliza- 
tion in England writes, " No reform can produce real good unless 
it is the work of public opinion, and unless the people themselves 
take the initiative." Nor should reforms inaugurated be depend- 
ent upon a single life. This was a fatal weakness in the move- 
ment of reform by the kings themselves. When a benevolent 
despot died, too often his work ended with his life. 

The year preceding the death of Joseph II the French Revolu- 
tion had begun. The people as well as their kings had been 
studying the philosophers and the political economists, and they 
were now themselves to assume the role of reformers. We shall 
see with what success they met in their new part. 

Secondary Works. — Bright, /<?j-^//^ //, is the best short biography of 
the Emperor in English, Coxe, History of the House of Austria, vol. iii, 
chaps, cxxiv-cxxxi. Hassall, The Balance of Power, lyi^-ijSg, chap. xiii. 
Stephens, Syllabus of Lectures on Modern European History, Lect, xlvii, 
gives a helpful summary of Emperor Joseph's policies and reforms. 



II. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND THE 

NAPOLEONIC ERA 

(1 789-181 5) 

CHAPTER XXXIII 
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION (1789-1799) 

I. Causes of the Revolution ; the States-General 

OF 1789 

552. Introductory. — The French Revolution, in its deepest 
impulses, was a continuation of the Renaissance and the Refor- 
mation. It was the spirit of the intellectual revival and the reli- 
gious reform at work in the political and the social realm. It was 
the revolt of the French people against royal despotism and class 
privilege. "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity" was the motto 
of the Revolution. In the name of these principles great crimes 
were indeed committed ; but these excesses of the Revolution are 
not to be confounded with its true spirit and aims. The French 
people in 1789 contended for substantially the same principles 
that the English people defended in 1642 and 1688, and that the 
American colonists maintained in 1776. It is only as we view 
them in this Hght that we can feel a sympathetic interest in the 
men and events of this tumultuous period of French history. 

553. Causes of the Revolution. — Chief among the causes of 
the French Revolution were the abuses and extravagances of the 
Bourbon monarchy, the unjust privileges enjoyed by the nobil- 
ity and the higher clergy, the wretched condition of the poorer 
classes of the people, and the revolutionary character and spirit 
of French philosophy and literature. To these must be added, as 

500 



THE BOURBON MONARCHY 50I 

a proximate cause, the influence of the American Revolution. 
We will speak briefly of these several matters. 

Even the hastiest examination of the condition of France dur- 
ing the century preceding the tremendous social upheaval will 
enable us to understand how an English statesman/ writing a 
generation before the bursting of the storm, could say, " All the 
symptoms which I have ever met with in history, previous to 
great changes and revolutions in government, now exist and daily 
increase in France." 

554. The Bourbon Monarchy. — We simply repeat what we 
have already learned when we say that the authority of the French 
crown under the Bourbons had become unbearably despotic and 
oppressive. The life and property of every person in France were 
at the arbitrary disposal of the king. Persons were thrown into 
prison without even knowing the offense for which they were 
arrested. Lettres de cachet, or sealed warrants for arrest, were 
even signed by the king in blank and given to his favorites to use 
against their personal enemies. 

The taxes were imposed by the authority of the king alone. 
They struck the poor rather than the rich, and, in consequence 
of a miserable and corrupt system of collection, not more than 
one half or two thirds of the money wrung from the taxpayers 
ever reached the royal treasury. The public money thus gathered 
was squandered in maintaining a court the scandalous extrava- 
gances and debaucheries of which would shame a Turkish sultan. 

Meanwhile aU public works and all national interests, after 
the reign of Louis XIV, were utterly neglected. Louis XV, it is 
asserted, " probably spent more money on his harem than on 
any department of state." Louis XVI was sincerely desirous of 
reform. So far as good intentions go, he deserves a place among 
the best of the benevolent despots. But unfortunately he did not 
possess the qualities essential in a reformer; he was weak and 
irresolute. Besides, it was too late. Matters had gone too far. 
France was already caught in the rapids that sweep down to the 
abyss of revolution. 

1 Lord Chesterfield, writing in 1753. 



502 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

555. The Nobility. — The French nobility on the eve of the 
Revolution numbered probably between twenty and thirty thou- 
sand families, comprising about a hundred or a hundred and fifty 
thousand persons. Although owning one fifth of the soil of France 
and exercising feudal rights over much of the land belonging to 
peasant proprietors, still these nobles paid scarcely any taxes. 

The higher nobility were chiefly the pensioners of the king, 
the ornaments of his court, living in riotous luxury at Paris and 
Versailles. Stripped of their ancient power, they still retained all 
the old pride and arrogance of their order, and clung tenaciously 
to all their feudal privileges and exemptions. The rents of their 
estates, with which they supplemented the bounty of the king, 
were wrung from their wretched tenants with pitiless severity. 
That absentee landlordism which has created such poverty in 
Ireland and engendered such bitterness in the hearts of the Irish 
peasants towards their English landlords will serve to illustrate 
in some measure the relation of the French nobles to their tenants 
at the time of which we are speaking. 

556. The Higher Clergy. — The upper clergy formed a decayed 
feudal hierarchy. A third of the lands of France was in their 
hands, and this immense property was almost wholly exempt 
from taxation. The bishops and abbots were usually drawn from 
the ranks of the nobility, being attracted to the service of the 
Church rather by its enormous revenues and the social distinc- 
tion conferred by its offices than by the inducements of piety. 
They owed their position to royal appointment, and commonly 
spent their princely incomes in luxurious life at court. 

The relation of these "patrician prelates" to the people and 
to the humbler clergy should be carefully noted, otherwise cer- 
tain important phases of the Revolution will not be understood. 
Though there were noble exceptions, the most of these dignitaries 
were narrow-minded and self-seeking, and many of them so shame- 
lessly immoral that as a class they had lost all credit and authority 
with the people whose shepherds they ostensibly were. And not 
only had they discredited themselves, but they had brought the 
Church and even Christianity itself into disrepute. The hatred 



THE COMMONS, OR THIRD ESTATE 503 

the people felt towards them was transferred to the religion which 
they so unworthily represented. 

The lower clergy, made up in the main of humble parish priests, 
were drawn largely from the peasant class, and shared their poverty. 
Their salaries were mere pittances compared with the princely 
incomes enjoyed by the bishops and abbots. Their exemplary 
lives and their faithfulness in the performance of the duties of 
their sacred calling presented a reproving contrast to the debauch- 
eries and infidelities of their ecclesiastical superiors. They were 
naturally in sympathy with the lower classes to which by birth they 
belonged, and shared their feelings of dislike towards the great 
prelates on account of their selfish pride and odious arrogance. 

557. The Commons, or Third Estate. — Below the two privileged 
orders stood the nonprivileged commons, known as the Tiers 
Etat, or Third Estate. This class embraced all the nation aside 
from the nobility and the clergy, — that is to say, the great bulk 
of the population. It numbered probably about twenty-five million 
souls. The order was divided into two chief classes, namely, the 
bourgeoisie^ or middle class, and the peasantry. 

The middle class, which was comparatively small in numbers, 
was made up of the well-to-do and wealthy merchants, traders, 
lawyers, and other professional men. It constituted the most intel- 
ligent portion of the French nation. It was from this class that 
came most of the leaders of the revolutionary movement during 
its earlier stages. 

The peasants constituted the majority of the Third Estate. 
The condition of most of them could hardly have been worse. 
Their only recognized use in the state was " to pay feudal serv- 
ices to the lords,^ tithes to the priests, and imposts to the king." 
Especially vexatious were the old feudal regulations to which they 
were subjected in the cultivation of the soil. Thus they were for- 
bidden to fence their fields for the protection of their crops, as 



2 Though practically all the French peasantry had long since been emancipated 
from the personal servitude of mediaeval serfdom, still the majority of them owed to 
some lord feudal dues for the land they tilled, and were bound to pay tolls at his 
mill, oven, and wine press. See sec. 95. 



504 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

the fences interfered with the lord's progress in the hunt; they 
were not allowed to frighten away the game which fed upon their 
vegetables ; and they were even prohibited from cultivating their 
fields at certain seasons, as this disturbed the nesting partridges. 

Being kept in a state of abject poverty, a failure of their crops 
reduced the French tenants to absolute starvation. It was not an 
unusual thing to find women and children dead in the woods or 
along the roadways. The words addressed by Fenelon to Louis 
XIV in 1693 might with almost equal truth have been addressed 
to Louis XVI : " Your people are dying of hunger," he said ; 
" instead of money being wrenched from these poor creatures, 
clothes and food should be given them. France is simply a large 
hospital, full of woe and empty of food." 

Another who saw all this misery thus pictures the appearance 
of the peasantry: "One sees certain fierce animals, male and 
female, scattered through the fields; they are black, livid, and 
burned by the sun, and attached to the soil, which they dig up 
and stir with indomitable industry ; they have what is like an 
articulate voice, and when they rise up on their feet they show a 
human face, — in truth they are human beings. They retire at 
night into dens, where they live on black bread and water and 
roots ; they save other men the trouble of sowing and dehdng 
and harvesting, and hence deserve not to lack of this bread 
which they have sown." ^ 

It is true that during the eighteenth century the condition of 
perhaps the majority of the French peasants had been much 
improved, and that on the eve of the Revolution their state was 
much more tolerable than that of the peasantry in the countries 
of Central and Eastern Europe. The number of peasant proprie- 
tors had become large and was steadily increasing, and in many 
districts at least was greater than at any earlier period. Yet 
never had a more rebellious spirit stirred in the French peasantry 
than at just this time. And the reason of this was not because 
the system under which they lived was " more severe, but more 
odious " than ever before, — more odious because the peasant of 

8 La Bruyere, Les Caracteres, " De 1' Homme," § cxxviii. 



FRENCH PHILOSOPHY 505 

1789, being more intelligent, realized more keenly the wrongs he 
suffered, and knew better his rights as a man than did the igno- 
rant, stolid peasant of the previous century. So true is it, as Hegel 
affirms, that Revolution is impossible without Renaissance.* 

558. The Revolutionary Spirit of French Philosophy ; Repre- 
sentative Authors. — French philosophy in the eighteenth cen- 
tury was bold, skeptical, and revolutionary. Its dominant note 
was one of passionate protest against the inequalities of the exist- 
ing system of society and government. The great writers — 
Montesquieu, Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, and D'Alembert — 
represent its prevailing spirit and tendency.^ 

Montesquieu (i 689-1 755) was a great admirer of English 
institutions. He had passed almost two years of his early life in 
England and had thus become imbued with English i^eas and 
English love of constitutional government. His most important 
work was entitled The Spirit of Laws, a work which had a 
remarkable influence upon the enlightened despots of the latter 
part of the eighteenth century. 

Voltaire (1694-1778) was the very impersonation of the tend- 
encies of his age. He gave expression, forcible and striking, to 
what the people were vaguely thinking and feeling. In the use 
of satire and irony he never had a superior, if a peer. He has 

4 The truth of this law underlying the historical development is shown in the 
antecedents of the English Revolution of the seventeenth century and of the American 
Revolution of the eighteenth. In neither case was it the actual burdens imposed by 
despotic authority which provoked rebellion. The real cause of revolt in each case 
was that general intelligence of the people which made even the slightest infringement 
of rights seem intolerable. Compare sec. 725. 

5 The fountain head of this freedom-loving and skeptical philosophy was in Eng- 
land. From the death of Louis XIV on to the commencement of the Revolution, 
England was a sort of Mecca for the literary and philosophical French world. Speak- 
ing of the results of this worship of the men of France at the English shrine, Buckle 
writes as follows : " Their determination to search for liberty in the place where alone 
it could be found, gave rise to that junction of the French and English intellects 
which, looking at the immense chain of its effects, is by far the most important fact 
in the history of the eighteenth century " {History of Civilization ijt England, vol. i, 
chap. xii). Prominent among the English scientists and writers who most deeply 
influenced French science and philosophy were Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), John 
Locke (1632-1704), Lord Shaftesbury (1671-1713), and Lord Bolingbroke (1678- 
1751). Much of Voltaire's work was largely a popularization of the science of New* 
ten and the philosophy of Locke. 



5o6 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



been well called '' the magician of the art of writing." He had a 
most marvelous faculty of condensing thought; putting whole 
philosophies in an epigram, he supplied the French people with 
proverbs for a century. He loved justice, in Carlyle's phrase, as 
it should be loved. His aim was to do away with injustice, preju- 
dices, and superstitions, and to make justice and reason domi- 
nant in human affairs. He disbelieved in revealed religion ; ^ he 
would have men follow simply their inner sense of what is right 
and reasonable. His influence upon Frederick the Great of 

Prussia and upon other reforming 
kings and ministers was very great. 
In truth his writings stirred all Eu- 
rope as well as all France, and did 
so much to prepare the minds and 
hearts of men for the Revolution 
and to determine its course that in 
one sense there was much truth in 
his declaration, " I have accom- 
plished more in my day than either 
Luther or Calvin." 

Rousseau (i 7 1 2-1 7 78), like Vol- 
taire, had neither faith nor hope in 
existing institutions. Society and 
government seemed to him contriv- 
ances designed by the strong for the enslavement of the weak : 
" Man was born free and is everywhere in chains " is the burden 
of his complaint. Consequently he would do away with all these 
things. He would have men give up their artificial, complex Hfe 
in society and return to the simplicity of what he called " a state 
of nature." He idealized the life of savages, and declared that 
untutored tribes were happier than civilized men. He drew such 
an idyllic picture of the life of man in a state of nature that 
Voltaire, after reading his treatise thereon, wrote him that it filled 
him mth a longing to go on all fours. 




- Voltaire. (From a 
statue by Hozidoji) 



6 By some of Voltaire's disciples his doctrines were developed into atheism; but 
Voltaire himself was a deist, combating alike atheism and Christianity. 



EFFECTS OF THIS PHILOSOPHY 



50; 



!Rousseau's greatest work was entitled The Social Contract. 
The state, according to him, is a voluntary association or brother- 
hood of equals. From this followed the sovereignty of the people 
and the abolition of inequality and class oppression. The writings 
of Rousseau had an extraordinary influence upon liberal-minded 
and generous souls everywhere. The framers of the American 
l)eclaration of Rights drew from his works many of their ideas 
and even phrases. The aid which France extended to the 
American colonists, in so far as that aid was prompted by a gen- 
erous enthusiasm for republican ideals, was a direct outcome of 
the teachings of Rousseau. The ideahsts and dreamers of the 
French Revolution were wholly under the spell cast upon the 
world by the " New Gospel of Humanity " preached so fervently 
by the author of The Social Contract. 

. Diderot (17 13-1784) and D'Alembert (17 17-1783) were the 
chief of the so-called Encyclopedists, the compilers of an im- 
mense work in twenty-eight volumes. The purpose of this pro- 
digious compilation was to gather up and systematize all the facts 
in science and history in possession of the world, in order that 
this knowledge might be made the basis of a philosophy of life 
and of the universe which should supersede all the old systems of 
thought and belief resting simply on authority. 

559. The Effects of this Philosophy. — The tendency and effect 
of this skeptical philosophy was to create hatred and contempt 
for the institutions of both State and Church, and to foster discon- 
tent with the established order of things. 

Nor was it difficult for the theoretical revolutionists to secure 
the ear of a people proverbially impulsive and imaginative, and 
suffering to the point of desperation from the unequal and oppres- 
sive arrangements of a wholly artificial society. The grand ideas 
of the proposed crusade for the recovery of the rights of man 
could not fail of appealing powerfully to that imaginative genius 
of the French people which had led them to be foremost in the 
romantic expeditions for the recovery of the Holy Sepulcher. 

This daring, skeptical, revolutionary philosophy, having once 
taken possession of the minds of the French people, was bound, 



5o8 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

sooner or later, to find expression in their acts. " Human thought," 
says Lamartine, " is like the Divine Mind : it makes everything 
in its own image." We shall soon see this philosophy making 
history, and making it like unto itself.'^ 

560. Influence of the American Revolution. — Not one of the 
least potent of the proximate causes of the French Revolution was 
the successful establishment of the American republic. "The 
American Revolution has laid the foundation of another in France, 
if the government does not take care of itself," wrote Arthur 
Young just on the eve of the outbreak in France. " Without the 
successful termination of the American War of Independence," 
writes Professor H. Morse Stephens, "it may be doubted whether 
the French Revolution would have developed as it did, or whether 
it would have taken place at all." 

The French people sympathized deeply with the English colo- 
nists in their struggle for independence. Many of the nobility, 
like Lafayette, — for the French nobles, strangely blind to the 
logical consequences of the new philosophy, were very many of 
them its enthusiastic disciples, — offered to the patriots the serv- 
ice of their swords ; and the popular feeling, combined with a 
revengeful wish to see the British Empire dismembered, finally 
led the French government to extend to them openly the aid of 
the armies of France. 

The final triumph of the cause of liberty awakened scarcely 
less enthusiasm and rejoicing in France than in America. The 
republican simpHcity of the newborn state, contrasting so strongly 
with the extravagance and artificiality of the court at Versailles, 
elicited the unbounded admiration of the French people. In this 
young repubhc of the Western world they saw realized the Arcadia 
of their philosophy.^ It was no longer a dream. They themselves 
had helped to make it real. Here the rights of man had been 

"^ The teachings of the eighteenth-century French political economists were in spirit 
and tendency like the doctrines promulgated by the French thinkers and writers in 
other fields. The most noted of these economists were Quesnay (1694-1774), Vincent 
de Gournay (1712-1759), and Turgot (1727-1781). 

8 For a fine illustration of this, see Trevelyan's American Revolution, Part I, 
PP- 52, 53- 



END OF THE REIGN OF LOUIS XV 509 

recovered and vindicated. And now this liberty which the French 
people had helped the American colonists to secure, they were 
impatient to see France herself enjoy. 

561. End of the Reign of Louis XV; " After us the Deluge." 
— The long-gathering tempest is now ready to break over France. 
Louis XV died in 1 774. In the early part of his reign his subjects 
had affectionately called him " the Well-Beloved," but long before 
he laid down his scepter all their early love and admiration had 
been turned into hatred and contempt. Besides being overbear- 
ing and despotic, the king was indolent and scandalously profli- 
gate. During twenty years of his reign, as we have already learned, 
he was wholly under the influence of the notorious Madame de 
Pompadour (sec. 457). 

The inevitable issue of this orgy of folly and extravagance 
seems to have been clearly enough perceived by the chief actors 
in it, as is shown by that reckless phrase attributed to the king 
and his favorite, — "After us the Deluge." And after them the 
deluge indeed did come. The near thunders of the approaching 
tempest could already be heard when Louis XV lay down to die. 

562. The Accession of Louis XVI (1774) ; Financial Troubles; 
the Meeting of the Notables (1787). — Louis XV left the tottering 
throne to his grandson, Louis XVI, then only twenty years of 
age. He had recently been married to the beautiful and light- 
hearted Archduchess Marie Antoinette of Austria. The first act of 
the young couple, upon learning that the burdens of sovereignty 
had descended upon their shoulders, was, it was rumored, to cast 
themselves upon their knees with the prayer, " O God ! guide and 
protect us ; we are too young to govern ! " Well indeed might 
they appeal to Heaven ; there was no earthly help. 

How to raise money was the urgent and anxious question with 
the government. France was on the verge of bankruptcy. The 
king called to his side successively Turgot, Necker, and other 
eminent statesmen as his ministers of finance ; but their policies 
and remedies availed little or nothing. The traditions of the 
court, the rigidity of long-established customs, and the heartless 
selfishness of the privileged classes rendered reform ia taxation 



5IO 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



and efficient retrenchment impossible. The national debt grew 
constantly larger. The people charged all to the extravagance of 
the queen, whom they called " Madame Deficit." 

In 1787 the king summoned the Notables, a body composed 
chiefly of great lords and prelates, who had not been called to 
advise with the king since the year 1626. But miserable coun- 
selors were they all. Refusing to give up any of their feudal privi- 
leges, or to tax the property of their own orders that the enormous 
public burden s which were crushing the commons might be light- 
ened, their coming together resulted in nothing. 

563. The Calling of the States-General ; the Elections ; the 
Cahiers. — As a last resort it was resolved to summon the united 
wisdom of the nation, to call together the States-General, the 
almost-forgotten national assembly, composed of representatives 
of the three estates, — the nobility, the clergy, and the commons. 

In December, 1788, the king by proclamation called upon the 
French people to elect deputies to this body, which had not met 
to deliberate upon the affairs of France for a period of one hun- 
dred and seventy-five years. Divine-right royalty had seen no 
necessity hitherto of seeking counsel of the people. The sum- 
moning of the ancient assembly was an acknowledgment that 
absolute monarchy had failed in France, How complete and irre- 
mediable that failure was, was recognized by no one as yet. 

In connection with the elections there had been made by the 
king's advisers a momentous decision, one which practically in- 
volved the fate of" the monarchy. The commons, conscious that 
they formed the overwhelming majority of the nation, insisted 
upon being allowed double representation, that is, as many deputies 
as both the other orders. The minister, Necker, yielded to this- 
demand. They were authorized to send up six hundred deputies^ 
while the nobility and the clergy were each to have only three 
hundred representatives. 

The electors had been instructed to draw up statements of 
grievances and suggestions of reform for the information and- 
guidance of the States- General. Very many of these documents, 
which are known as cahiers^ were substantially copies of models 



MEETING OF THE STATES-GENERAL 511 

drawn up by lawyers and others and widely distributed ; never- 
theless they form a valuable record of the France of 1789, of 

the grievances of the people, of their ideas of reform, and of their 
aspirations. One demand common to them all is that the nation 
through its representatives shall have part in the government. 
Those of the Third Estate call for the abolition of feudal rents 
and services, and for the equalization among the orders of the 
burdens of taxation. In a word, they were petitions for equality 
and justice. 

564. The States-General changed into the National Assembly. 
— On the fifth of May, 1789, a memorable date, the deputies to 
the States-General met at Versailles. Thither the eyes of the 
nation were, now turned in hope and expectancy.' Surely if the 
redemption of France could be worked out by human wisdom, it 
would now be effected. 

At the very outset a dispute arose between the privileged orders 
and the commons respecting the manner of voting. It had been 
the ancient custom of the body for each order to deliberate in its 
own hall, and for the vote upon all questions to be by orders.^ 
But the commons now demanded that this old custom should be 
ignored, and that the voting should be by individuals ; for should 
the vote be taken by orders, then their double representation would 
be amere mockery, and the clergy and nobiHty by combining 
could always outvote them. For five weeks the quarrel kept every- 
thing in a deadlock. 

Finally, the commons, emboldened by the tone of public opinion 
without, took a decisive, revolutionary step. They declared them- 
selves the National Assembly, and then invited the other two 
orders to join them in their deliberations, giving them to under- 
stand that if they did not choose to do so they should proceed to 
the consideration of public affairs without them. 

King, nobles, and prelates were alarmed at the bold attitude 
assumed by the commons. The king, in helpless alarm, suspended 

9 That is to say, the majority of the representatives of each order decided the 
vote for that order, and then two of these majority votes registered the decision of 
the whole body of deputies. 



512 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

the sitting of the rebellious deputies and guarded the door of 
their hall. But the commons, gathering in the tennis court, a 
great barnlike building without seats, bound themselves by oath 
not to separate until they had framed a constitution for France. 
This act was very much like that of the members of the . Long 
Parliament, who practically opened the English Revolution by 
resolving that they should not be dissolved without their own 
consent (sec. 467). 

Shut out from the tennis court, the representatives of the Third 
Estate met in one of the churches of Versailles. Here they were 
joined by two of the nobility and a large number of the deputies 
of the clergy. It looked as though the three orders would soon 
coalesce. The court party labored to prevent this. A royal sitting, 
or joint meeting of the three estates, was held. The king, influ- 
enced by his advisers, read a speech in which, assuming the tone 
of an English Stuart, he admonished the commons not to attack 
the privileges of the other orders, and then commanded the depu- 
ties of the three orders to retire to their separate halls. The clergy 
and the nobility obeyed. The commons kept their seats. 

At this juncture the master of ceremonies somewhat pertly said 
to them, " You heard the king's command ? ' ' Thereupon Mirabeau, 
one of the leaders of the commons, a man of " Jupiter-like " mien 
and tone, turned upon the messenger with these memorable words : 
" Go, tell those who sent you that we are here by the command 
of the people, and here we shall stay until driven out at the point 
of the bayonet." The poor official was so frightened at the ter- 
rible Mirabeau that he straightway sought the door, withdrawing 
from the assembly, however, backwards, as he had been wont to 
do in retiring from the presence of the king. His instincts were 
right. He was indeed in the presence of the sovereign, — the new- 
born sovereign of France. 

The triumph of the Third Estate was soon complete. Real- 
izing that it was futile and dangerous longer to oppose the will of 
the commons, the king ordered those of the nobles and clergy 
who had not yet joined them to do so, and they obeyed. The 
States-General thus became in reality the National Assembly. 



THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY 



513 



This union of the three estates in the National Assembly was 
merely the registering of the result of the silent revolution which 
through the preceding centuries had been gradually transforming 
the France of feudal times, made up of the three orders of the 
clergy, nobility, and Third Estate, into the France of 1789, made 
up not of orders but of individuals, — of individuals who were 
already potentially citizens free and equal before the law. 



II. The National or Constituent Assembly 
(June 17, 1789-Sept. 30, 1791) 

565. Prominent Men in the Assembly. — Lamartine declares 
that the National Assembly was " the most imposing body of men 
that ever represented not only France but the human race." It 
was impressive not so much from the 
ability or genius of its individual 
members, though the picked men of 
France were here gathered, as through 
the tremendous interest it held in its 
hands. Yet there were in the Assem- 
bly a number of men whose names 
cannot be passed in silence. 

Among the nobility was the pa- 
triotic Lafayette, who had won the 
admiration of his countrymen by 
splendid services rendered the strug- 
gling repubhc in the New World. His 
influence at this time was probably Fig. 89. — Mirabeau. (After 

., -1 . r J.^ a paintinsf by Z, Massard) 

greater than that of any other man. t- ^ ^ ' 

Belonging by birth to the same order, but sitting now as a 
deputy of the commons, w^as Mirabeau, a large-headed, dissolute, 
unscrupulous man, an impe.tuous orator, the mouthpiece of the 
Revolution. But though violent in speech he was moderate in 
counsel. He wanted to right the wrongs of the people, yet with- 
out undermining the throne. He wanted reform but not revo- 
lution. He aspired to be a leader, but no one at first had 




514 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

confidence in him, such had been his past life. Arthur Young 
said of him, "His character is a dead weight upon him." Yet, 
notwithstanding his lack of private virtues, Mirabeau's quahties 
of leadership at length gained for him recognition, and he was 
at one time president of the National Assembly. But his life of 
dissipation had undermined his constitution. He died in 1791, 
despairing of the future for France. 

Also among the deputies of the Third Estate sat another man 
whom we must notice, — Robespierre, not much known as yet, 
but of whom we shall hear enough by and by. 

Still another most eminent representative of the commons was 
Abb^ Sieyes, a person of wonderful facility in framing constitu- 
tions. France will have much need of such talent, as we shall 
see. Sieyes had recently stirred the whole country by a remark- 
able pamphlet entitled Whaf is the Third Estate ? (^Qu^est-ce 
que le Tiers Etat?). He answers, '^ Everything ! " " What has it 
been hitherto ? " " Nothing ! " *' What does it wish? " " To be 
something." 

566 . Origin of the Revolutionary Commune of Paris ; the National 
Guards. — While the States-General was metamorphosing itself into 
the National Assembly, the government of Paris was undergoing 
a somewhat similar transformation. During all these weeks the 
capital was in a seething ferment. The king at last imprudently 
began to mass troops about Versailles, as if to overawe the national 
representatives. The inhabitants of the capital resolved to take 
precautionary measures. The municipal authorities showing them- 
selves irresolute and timid, the leading men of the different sections 
or wards of the city ousted them, and then, forming themselves 
into a sort of provisional city council, assumed the government 
of the capital. Thus in this moment of tumult and confusion was 
born the revolutionary Commune of Paris, a body whose power 
came to overshadow that of the National Assembly itself. 

Under the direction of the self-constituted Commune the inhabit- 
ants of the capital now formed themselves into a sort of police 
force. Other cities throughout France imitated Paris and organ- 
ized their militia. These hastily recruited popular bodies took the 



STORMING OF THE BASTILLE 



515 



name of National Guards, and under that title were destined to 
act a most conspicuous part in the scenes of the Revolution. 

567. Storming of the BastUle (July 14, 1789). —Thus all Paris 
was ready to burst into conflagration. The news of the dismissal 
by the king of Necker, a minister in whom the people had great 
confidence, kindled the inflammable mass. On the morning of 
July 14 a great mob -assaulted the Bastille, the old state prison 
and, in the eyes of the people, the emblem of royal despotism. 
In a few hours the fortress was in the hands of the people. The 
curious crowds ransacked every corner of the grim old dungeon, 
liberating the seven prisoners they found in its gloomy cells. 
The governor and others of the defenders of the place were 
murdered, their heads placed at the end of pikes, and thus borne 
through the streets. The walls of the hated old prison were razed 
to the ground, and the people danced on the spot. The key of 
the dungeon was sent by Lafayette to Washington " as a trophy 
of the spoils of despotism." In a letter accompanying the gift, 
Lafayette wrote : " That the principles of America opened the 
Bastille is not to be doubted, and therefor-e the key goes to the 
right place." ^^ 

The destruction by the Paris mob of the Bastille was the death 
knell not only of Bourbon despotism in France but of royal 
tyranny everywhere. The intelligence of the event was received 
with rejoicing in America and wherever the ideas and principles 
of seK-government were entertained. When the news reached 
England, the great statesman Fox, perceiving its significance for 
liberty, exclaimed, "How much is this the greatest event that 
ever happened in the world, and how much the best ! " 

Louis XVI regarded the matter with different feelings. When 
news of the affair was carried to hini at Versailles he exclaimed, 
" What, Rebellion ! " " No, sire," was the response ; " it is Revo- 
lution.^'' The great French Revolution had indeed begun. 

568. The Abolition of Privileges (August 4, 1789). — As the 
news of the storming of the Bastille spread through France the 
peasantry in many districts, following the example set them by 
10 The rusty relic may be seen to-day in a case at Mount Vernon. 



5i6 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

the capital, destroyed the local bastilles and sacked and burned 
the castles of the nobles. The main object of the peasants was to 
destroy the title deeds in the archives of the manor houses, since 
it was by virtue of these charters that the lords exercised so many 
rights over the lands of the peasants and exacted so many teasing 
and iniquitous tolls and dues. This terrorism caused the begin- 
ning of what is known as the emigration of the nobles, that is, 
their flight beyond the frontiers of France. 

The storm without hastened matters within the National Assem- 
bly at Versailles. The privileged orders now realized that, to save 
themselves from the fury of the masses, they must give up those 
vexatious feudal privileges which were a main cause of the suf- 
ferings and the anger of the people. Rising in the tribune, two 
young and liberal-minded members of the nobihty represented 
that they were willing to renounce all their feudal rights and ex- 
emptions. A contagious enthusiasm was awakened by this act 
of patriotic generosity. The impulsiveness of the Gallic heart was 
never better illustrated. Everybody wanted to make sacrifices 
for the common good. The nobles and the clergy, crowding to the 
tribune, strove with one another in generous rivalry to see who 
should make the greatest sacrifices in the surrender of rents, 
tolls, fees, feudal dues, and gaming privileges. Thus in a single 
night much of the rubbish of the broken-down feudal system was 
cleared away. 

569.* The Declaration of the Rights of Man (August 26, 1789). 
— After the abolition of the feudal system the next work of the 
National Assembly was the drawing up of a Declaration of the 
Rights of Man. This was in imitation of what had been done by 
the American patriots. 

The dominant notes of the Declaration were (i) the equahty 
of men, — " Men are born and remain free and equal " ; (2) the 
sovereignty of the people, — "All sovereignty resides essentially in 
the nation " ; (3) the impartial nature of law, — " Law is the ex- 
pression of the general will . . . and should be the same for all " ; 
and (4) the inviolability of personal liberty, — " No person shall 
be arrested or imprisoned save according to the forms of law." 



TO VERSAILLES" 



517 



570. " To Versailles " ; the Royal Family taken to Paris (Oct. 
6, 1789). — An imprudent act on the part of the king and his 
friends at Versailles brought about the next episode in the prog- 
ress of the Revolution. The arrival there of a body of troops was 
made the occasion of a banquet to the officers of the regiment. 
While heated with wine the young nobles had trampled under- 
foot the national tricolored cockades, and substituted for them 
white cockades, the emblem of the Bourbons. The report of these 
proceedings caused in Paris the wildest excitement. Rumors of 
the intended flight of the king to Metz, and of plots against the 
national cause, added fuel to the flames. Besides, bread had failed, 
and the poorer classes were savage from hunger. 

On the 5 th of October a mob of desperate women collected 
in the streets of Paris, determined upon going to Versailles and 
demanding rehef from the king himself. A horrible multitude, 
savage as the hordes that followed Attila, streamed out of the 
city towards Versailles. The National Guards, infected with the 
delirium of the moment, forced their commander, Lafayette, to 
lead them in the same direction. Thus all day Paris emptied itself 
into the royal suburb. 

The mob encamped in the streets of Versailles for the night. 
Early the following morning they broke into the palace, killed 
two of the guards, and forced their way to the chamber of the 
queen, who barely escaped with her life to the king's apartments. 
The timely arrival of Lafayette alone saved the entire royal 
family from being massacred. 

The mob now demanded that the king should go with them to 
Paris. Louis was constrained to yield. The procession arrived 
at Paris in the evening. The royal family were placed in the 
palace of the Tuileries, and Lafayette was charged with the duty of 
guarding the king, who was to be held as a sort of hostage for the 
good conduct of the nobles and the foreign sovereigns while the 
new constitution was being prepared by the- Assembly, which had 
followed the king to the capital. 

Such was what was called the Joyous Entry of October 6. The 
palace at Versailles, thus stripped of royalty and left bespattered 



5l8 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

with blood, was destined never again to be occupied as the resi- 
dence of a king of France. 

571. Nationalization of Church Property (Nov. 2, 1789); the 
Civil Constitution of the Clergy (July 12, 1790). — For two years 
following the Joyous Entry there was a comparative lull in the 
storm of the Revolution. The king was kept a close prisoner in 
the Tuileries. The National Assembly was making sweeping 
reforms both in State and Church, and busying itself in framing 
a new constitution. One of the most important of its measures 
and one far-reaching in its effects was the confiscation of the prop- 
erty of the Church. Altogether, property consisting largely of 
lands, and worth it is estimated over a billion francs, was by 
decree made the property of the nation.^^ 

The nationalization of the property of the Church rendered it 
necessary that the nation should make some provision for the 
support of the clergy. This was done a little later by a decree 
known as the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. The decree pro- 
vided for a new division of France into archbishoprics, bishoprics, 
and parishes, and for the support of all ministers of religion by 
reasonable salaries paid by the nation. All the clergy, bishops, 
and parish priests alike were to be chosen by election, and all 
were to be required to take oath to support the new constitution. 

Naturally this conversion of the Church in France into an estab- 
lished national Church created a schism in the nation. Out of a 
hundred and thirty-four bishops only four would take the prescribed 
oath. From this time on a large section of the French clergy 
became the bitter enemies of the Revolution. 

572. Flight and Arrest of the King (June 20, 1791). — The 
attempt of the king to make his way out of France and join the 
emigrant nobles now gave an entirely new turn to the course of 
the Revolution. Under cover of night the royal family in disguise 

11 It being found impossible to sell at once and at fair prices so large an amount 
of real estate, the Assembl)', using the nationalized lands as security, issued against 
them currency notes, called assignats. As almost always happens in such cases, 
inflation of the currency resulted. Fresh issues of notes were made until they became 
quite worthless, as in the case of the Continental notes issued by the Continental 
Congress in the American War of Independence. 



THE CLUBS: JACOBINS AND CORDELIERS 519 

escaped from the Tuileries, and by post conveyance fled towards 
the frontier. When just a few hours more would have placed the 
fugitives in safety among friends, the Bourbon features of the king 
betrayed him, and the entire party was arrested and carried back 
to Paris. 

^The attempted flight of the royal family was a fatal blow to the 
monarchy. It deepened the growing distrust of the king. Many 
affected to regard it as equivalent on his part to an act of abdica- 
tion. The people began to talk of a republic. The word was only 
whispered as yet ; but it was not long before those who did not shout 
vociferously, " Vive la Republique ! " were hurried to the guillotine. 

573. The Clubs: Jacobins and Cordeliers. — In order to render 
intelligible the further course of the Revolution we must now speak 
of two clubs, or organizations, which came into prominence about 
this time, and which were destined to become more powerful than 
the Assembly itself, and to be the chief instruments in inaugu- 
rating the Reign of Terror. These were the societies of the Jacobins 
and the Cordeliers.^^ The objects of these clubs were to watch 
for conspiracies of the Royalists and by constant agitation to keep 
alive the flame of the Revolution. 

574. The New Constitution. — The work of the National 
Assembly was now drawing to a close. On the 14th of Sep- 
tember, 1 79 1, the new constitution framed by the body, which 
instrument made the government of France a constitutional mon- 
archy, was solemnly ratified by the king. The National Assembly, 
having sat over two years, then adjourned. The first scene in the 
drama of the French Revolution was ended. 

III. The Legislative Assembly (Oct. i, 1791-Sept. 19, 

1792) 

575. The Membership of the Assembly ; the Constitutionalists 
and the Girondins. — The new constitution provided for a na- 
tional legislature to be called the Legislative Assembly. This body 

12 The Jacobins were so called from an old convent in which their first meetings were 
held; the Cordeliers were named after a Franciscan convent where they assembled. 



520 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

was made up of several groups or parties, of which we need here 
notice only the Feuillants or Constitutionalists and the Girondins. 
The Constitutionalists, as their name implies, supported the new 
constitution, being in favor of a limited monarchy. The Girondins, 
so called from the department (the Gironde) whence their most 
noted leaders came, wanted to establish in France a federal 
repubhc like that just set up in the New World. 

576. The Temper of the Assembly. — Some seemingly trivial 
matters will serve to illustrate the spirit of the new Assembly. 
At the very outset the members were much perplexed in regard 
to how they should address the king and "wound neither the 
national dignity nor the royal dignity." Some were for using the 
titles Sire and Majesty, against which others indignantly protested, 
declaring that " the law and the people are the only Majesty.'' 
It was finally decided that Louis XVI should be called simply 
King of the French. 

Another thing which troubled th^ republican members was the 
gilded throne in which the king was wont to sit when he visited 
the Assembly. It was resolved that this article should be removed 
and an ordinary chair substituted for it, this to be placed in exact 
line with that occupied by the president of the Assembly. 

Again there were objections raised to the ceremony of the 
members rising and standing uncovered in the king's presence. 
So it was decreed that the members might sit before royalty 
with their hats on. 

577. Beginning of War with the Old Monarchies (April 20, 
1792), — The kings of Europe were watching with the utmost 
concern the course of events in France. They regarded the 
cause of Louis XVI as their own. If the French people should 
be allowed to overturn the throne of their hereditary sovereign, 
who any longer would have respect for the divine right of kings ? 

The warhke preparations of Austria, which had entered into 
an offensive and defensive alliance with Prussia, awakened the 
apprehensions of the Revolutionists, and led the Legislative 
Assembly to declare war against that power (April 20, 1792). 
A little later the aUied armies of the Austrians and Prussians 



MASSACRE OF THE SWISS GUARDS 



521 



crossed the frontiers of France. Thus was taken the first step in 
a series of -wars which were destined to last nearly a quarter of a 
century, and in which France almost single-handed was to struggle 
against the leagued powers of Europe and to illustrate the miracles 
possible to enthusiasm and genius. 

578. The Massacre of the Swiss Guards (August 10, 1792). — 
The allies at first gained easy victories Over the ill-disciplined 




Fig. 90. — The Lion of Lucerne. (From a photograph) 
This celebrated sculpture commemorates the loyalty and faithfulness of the 
Swiss guards who gave their lives in defense of the royal palace at Paris, 
August 10, 1792. See p. 522, n. 14 

forces of the Legislative Assembly, and the Duke of Brunswick, 
commander of the Prussian army, advanced rapidly upon Paris. 
An insolent proclamation which this general now issued (July 25, 
1792), wherein he ordered the French nation to submit to their 
king, and threatened the Parisians with the destruction of their 
city should any harm be done the royal family, drove the French 
people frantic with indignation and rage. 

. The first outbreak of the popular fury occurred in Paris. The 
mob of the capital was swollen by the arrival of bands of picked 



522 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

men from other parts of France. From the south came the " six 
hundred Marseillais who knew how to die." They brought with 
them "a better contingent than ten thousand pikemen," — the 
Marseillaise Hymn, the martial song of the Revolution.^^ 

On the morning of the loth of August the hordes of the city 
were mustered. The Palace of the Tuileries, defended by several 
hundred Swiss soldiers, the remnant of the royal guard, was 
assaulted. The royal family fled for safety to the hall of the 
Assembly near by. A terrible struggle followed in the corridors 
and upon the grand stairways of the palace. The Swiss stood 
" steadfast as the granite of their Alps." But they were over- 
whelmed at last, and all were killed, either in the building itself 
or in the surrounding courts and streets.^* 

579. The Massacre of September (" Jail Delivery "). — The army 
of the allies hurried on towards the capital to avenge the slaughter 
of the royal guards and to rescue the king. Paris was all excite- 
ment. "We must stop the enemy," cried Danton, "by striking 
terror into the Royalists." To this end the most atrocious meas- 
ures were now adopted. It was resolved that the Royalists con- 
fined in the jails of the capital should be killed. A hundred 
or more men acted as executioners, and to them the prisoners 
were handed over after a hasty examination before self-appointed 
judges. When the assassins grew weary refreshments were brought 
them, — " bread and wine for the laborers who were delivering the 
nation from its enemies." Refreshed by the bread and the wine, 
they resumed their work of emancipating France. 

The number of victims of this terrible " September Massacre," 
as it is called, is estimated^^ at from eight hundred to fourteen 

13 This famous -war sorig was composed in 1792 by Rouget de Lisle, a young 
French engineer. 

14 The number of Swiss guards slain was over seven hundred. Their fidelity 
and devotion are commemorated by one of the most impressive monuments in Europe, 
the so-called " Lion of Lucerne," at Lucerne in Switzerland. In a large recess in a 
cliff a dying lion, pierced by a lance, protects with its paw the Bourbon lilies. The 
wonderfully lifelike figure is cut out of the natural rock. The designer of the 
memorial was the celebrated Danish sculptor Thorvaldsen. 

16 Former estimates are now known to have been exaggerated. See Stephens, 
History of the French Revolution, vol. ii, p. 146. 



THE NATIONAL CONVENTION 523 

hundred. Europe had never before known such a " jail delivery." 
It was the greatest crime of the French Revolution. 

580. Defeat of the Allies. — Meanwhile, in the open field, the 
fortunes of war inclined to the side of the Revolutionists. The 
French army in the north was successful in checking the advance 
of the allies, and finally at Valmy (Sept. 20, 1792) succeeded in 
inflicting upon them a decisive defeat, which caused their hasty 
retreat beyond the frontiers of France. The day of this victory 
the Legislative Assembly came to an end, and the same day the 
National Convention assembled. 

IV. The National Convention (Sept. 20, 1792- 
Oct. 26, 1795) 

581. Parties in the Convention. — The Convention, consisting of 
seven hundred and forty-nine deputies, among whom was the cele- 
brated freethinker, Thomas Paine, embraced two active groups, 
the Girondins and the Mountainists,^^ the latter being so named 
from the circumstance that they sat on the upper benches in the 
Assembly hall. There were no monarchists; all were republicans. 
No one dared to speak of a monarchy. 

It was the Mountainists who were to shape the measures of the 
Convention. Their leaders were Danton and Robespierre, deputies 
of Paris. The party was inferior in numbers to that of the Giron- 
dins, but was superior in energy and daring, and was moreover 
backed by the Parisian mob. Its leaders wanted a strong govern- 
ment, which they believed should be maintained, if necessary, by 
a system of terror. 

582. The Establishment of the Republic (Sept. 21, 1792); 
Beginning of the Revolutionary Propaganda. -^ Almost the first act 
of the Convention was to abolish the monarchy. The motion for 
the abolition of royalty was not even discussed. "What need is 
there for discussion," exclaimed a delegate, " where all are agreed? 

16 There was a third group, comprising the great majority of the deputies, and 
known as the " Plain " or " Marsh," who had no well-formulated policy, and who acted 
sometimes with the Girondins and sometimes with the Mountainists. 



524 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



Courts are the hotbed of crime, the focus of corruption; the 
history of kings is the martyrology of nations." 

All titles of nobility were also abolished. Every one was to be 
addressed simply as citizen. In the debates of the Convention the 
king was alluded to as Citizen Capet, and on the street the shoe- 
black was called Citizen Shoeblack. 

The day following the establishment of the Republic (Sept. 22, 
1792) was made the beginning of a new era, the first day of the 
Year I.. That was to be regarded as the natal day of Liberty. 
A little later, incited by the success of the French armies, the 
Convention called upon all nations to rise against despotism, and 
pledged the aid of France to any people wishing to secure freedom. 

This call to the peoples of Europe to rise against their kings 
and to set up republican governments converted the revolutionary 
movement in France into a propaganda, and naturally made more 
implacable than ever the hatred' toward the Revolution felt by all 
lovers and beneficiaries of the old order of things. The declara- 
tion was a main cause of the fresh coalition formed against the 
new Republic and of the war of 1793. 

583. Trial and Execution of the King (Jan. 21, 1793). — The 
next work of the Convention was the trial and execution of the 
king. He was brought before the bar of that body, charged with 
having conspired with the enemies of France, of having opposed 
the will of the people, and of having caused the massacre of the 
loth of August. 

The sentence of the Convention was immediate death. On 
Jan. 21, 1793, the unfortunate monarch, after a last sad interview 
with his wife and children, was conducted to the scaffold. As his 
head fell beneath the knife of the guillotine, a great shout, '' Vive 
la Republique!'' burst from the surrounding multitudes, and 
echoed through the empty halls of the neighboring palace of the 
Tuileries. 

584. Coalition against France; the Counter-Revolution in La 
Vendee. — The regicide, together with the propaganda decree of 
the preceding year, awakened among all the old monarchies of 
Europe the most bitter hostility against the French Revolutionists. 



THE REVOLUTIONARY TRIBUNAL 525 

The act was interpreted as a threat against all kings. A grand 
coalition, embracing England, Austria, Prussia, the Protestant 
Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Sardinia, Tuscany, Naples, and the 
Holy Roman Empire, was formed to crush the republican move- 
ment. Armies aggregating more than a quarter of a million of 
men threatened France at once on every frontier. 

While thus beset with foes without, the Republic was threat- 
ened with even more dangerous enemies within. The people of 
La Vendee, in Western France, where the peasants were angered 
at the conscription decrees of the Convention, and where there 
was still a strong sentiment of loyalty to the Church and the 
monarchy, rose in revolt against the Revolutionists. 

585. Creation of the Revolutionary Tribunal (March 10, 1793) 
and of the Committee of Public Safety (April 6, 1793). — The 
defeat of the French armies in the north and the advance of the 
allies caused the greatest excitement among the Parisian popu- 
lace, who now demanded that the Convention should overawe 
the domestic enemies of the Revolution by the estabHshment 
of a judicial dictatorship, a sort of tribunal which should take 
cognizance of all crimes against the Republic. 

Danton, while acknowledging the injustice that the summary 
processes of such a court might do to many unjustly suspected, 
justified its establishment by arguing that in time of peace society 
lets the guilty escape rather than harm the innocent; but in 
times of public danger it should rather strike down the innocent 
than allow the guilty to escape. It was on this principle that 
France was to be governed for one terrible year. 

A little later was organized what was called the Committee of 
Public Safety, consisting of nine persons, members of the Con- 
vention. It was invested with dictatorial power. Danton, who 
became the leading member of the Committee, urged the forma- 
tion of this arbitrary executive body as the only expedient which 
would enable the nation to act with that dispatch and energy 
needful to save the Republic. "We must estabhsh a despotism 
of liberty," cried Marat, a prominent chief of the Cordeliers, 
"to crush the despotism of kings," The vast powers wielded 



526 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

by the Committee were delegated to it for a single month only, 
but were renewed from month to month. 

We must bear in mind the character of these two bodies in 
order to follow intelligently the subsequent events of the Revo- 
lution, and to understand how the atrocious tyranny of the Reign 
of Terror was exercised and maintained. 

586. The Fall of the Girondins (June 2, 1793). — Still gloomier 
tidings came from every quarter, — news of reverses to the 
armies of the Republic in front of the allies, and of successes 
of the counter-revolutionists in La Vendee. The Mountainists 
in the Convention, supported by the rabble of Paris, urged the 
most extreme measures. They proposed that the carriages of 
the wealthy should be seized and used for carrying soldiers to 
the seat of war, and that the expenses of the government should 
be met by forced contributions from the rich. 

The Girondins opposed these communistic measures. The 
Parisian mob filled the city with cries of " Down with the Giron- 
dins ! " ''If the person of the people's representative be vio- 
lated," warningly exclaimed one of the Girondin orators, " Paris 
will be destroyed, and soon the stranger will be compelled to 
inquire on which bank of the Seine the city stood." 

The Girondins were finally overborne. An immense mob sur- 
rounded the hall of the Convention and demanded that their 
chiefs be given up as enemies of the Republic. Thirty-one of 
their leaders were surrendered and placed under arrest, a pre- 
liminary step to the speedy execution of many of them during 
the opening days of the Reign of Terror. Thus did the Parisian 
mob purge tne National Convention of France, as the army purged 
Parliament in the English Revolution (sec. 474). 

587. Charlotte Corday; Assassination of Marat (July 13, 1793). 
— The arrest of the Girondin chiefs marks a turning point in 
the Revolution. Several escaped and attempted to stir up revolt 
in the provinces against the revolutionary leaders in Paris. Civil 
war was impending. 

At this juncture a maiden of Caen, in Normandy, Charlotte 
Corday by name, conceived the idea of delivering France from 



THE REIGN OF TERROR 



527 



the terrors of proscription and civil war by going to Paris and 
killing Marat,, whom she regarded as the leader of the Moun- 
tainists. On pretense of wishing to reveal to him something of 
importance, she gained admission to his rooms and stabbed him 
fatally. She atoned for the act under the knife of the guillotine. 

The Reign of Terror {September^'^ J793-July, 1794) 

588. The Great Committee of Public Safety; its Principle of 
Government. — The perilous situation created by domestic insur- 
rection and foreign invasion demanded a strong executive. It 
was created. The Convention reorganized the Committee of 
Public Safety, which now became what is known as the Great 
Committee of Public Safety, suspended the constitution, and 
invested the new board with supreme executive authority. For 
almost a full year the twelve men — of whom Robespierre was 
the most conspicuous — constituting this body exercised absolute 
power over the life and property of every person in France. The 
Committee's principle of government was simple. It governed by 
terror.^^ Its rule is known as the " Reign of Terror." 

In order to understand in any measure this passage of French 
history, we must put ourselves at the viewpoint of the Terrorists, 
as those responsible for the Terror are called. The most, if not 
all, of the men constituting the Great Committee were men of 
character, — some of their agents were unworthy creatures, who, 
misusing their authority, committed incredible crimes, — men 
governed by certain principles and ideals which seemed to them 
right and worthy. They were men who had persuaded themselves 
that opposition to the Revolution was a crime deserving death, 
and that France could be saved from anarchy and foreign sub- 
jection only by the quick and thorough suppression of all oppo- 
sition at home by the terrifying executions of the guillotine. For 

IJ" The beginning of the Reign of Terror cannot be dated with precision. 

18 It is illuminative to set the principle of government of the Terrorists in con 
trast with that of one of the most lovable of the Girondins. " They have sought to 
effect the Revolution by terror," said the great orator Vergniaud; "I have wish*-d 
to effect it by love." 



528 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



the same reasons the majority of the people of France acquiesced 
in this government by terror which the Committee established. 

589. The Execution of Marie Antoinette (Oct. 16, 1793). — 
One of the earliest victims of the guillotine under the organized 
Terror was the queen. The attention of the Revolutionists had 
been turned anew to the remaining members of the royal family 
by reason of the recognition by the allies of the Dauphin as king 
of France/^ and by the recent alarming successes of their armies. 

The queen, who had now borne 
nine months' imprisonment, was 
brought before the terrible Revo- 
lutionary Tribunal and condemned 
to the guillotine. She was con- 
veyed in a common cart to the 
same spot where, less than a year 
before, her husband had suffered. 
When she first appeared in the 
chamber of the dread tribunal, 
with her robes disordered, her hair 
blanched from anguish, and her 
face furrowed with sorrow, — so 
changed from that fair vision of 
beauty once the center of the bril- 
liant court of Versailles,^" — a wave 
of pity had rushed over the hearts of all beholders ; but the rising 
tide of sentiment had been checked, and now a hideous mob 
of men and women howled with savage delight around the cart 
which bore the unhappy queen to the scaffold. 




Fig. 91. — The Guillotine 



19 The Dauphin, a mere child of eight years, was recognized as king of France by- 
several of the great powers in January, 1793. He was at this time a prisoner in the 
Temple. He died in 1795, his death having been caused or at least hastened by the 
brutal ill usage he received at the hands of his jailers. 

20 " It is now sixteen or seventeen years sines I saw the queen of France, then 
the Dauphiness, at Versailles ; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly 
seemed to touch, a more delightful vision, I saw her just above the horizon, deco- 
rating and cheering the elevated sphere she just had begun to move in, — glittering like 
the morning star, full of life and splendor and joy." — Burke, Reflections on the 
French Revolution. 



EXECUTION OF THE GIRONDINS 529 

We need not speak of the faults of Marie Antoinette, though 
they were many; her patience, her heroism, and her sufferings 
were ample atonement for them all. 

590. Execution of the Girondins (Oct. 31, 1793) and of Madame 
Roland (Nov. 8, 1793). — The guillotine was now fed daily with 
the best blood of France. Two weeks after the execution of the 
queen twenty of the chiefs of the Girondins, who had been kept 
in confinement since their arrest in the Convention, were pushed 
beneath the knife. Hundreds of others followed. 

Most illustrious of all the victims after the queen was Madame 
Roland, who was accused of being the friend of the Girondins. 
An incident at the scaffold is related as a memorial of her. 
As she was about to lay her head beneath the knife, her eye, it 
is said, chanced to fall upon the statue of Liberty which stood 
near the scaffold. "O Liberty ! " she exclaimed; "what crimes 
are committed in thy name ! " 

It has ever been so. The worst crimes that stain the pages 
of history have been committed in the name of that which is 
holiest, — in the name of Liberty, or of Justice, or of ReHgion. 

591. The New Calendar. — While the Revolutionary Tribunal 
was clearing out of the way the enemies of the Repubhc by the 
quick processes of the guillotine, the Convention was busy reforming 
the ancient institutions and customs of the land. They hated these 
as having been established by kings and aristocrats to enhance 
their own importance and to enslave the masses. They proposed 
to sweep these things all aside and give the world a fresh start. 

A new uniform system of weights and measures, known as the 
metric,^^ had already been planned by the National Assembly ; 
a new mode of reckoning time was now introduced. The months 
were given new names, names expressive of the character of each. 
Each month was divided into three periods of ten days each, 
called decades, and each day into ten parts. The tenth day of 
each decade took the place of the old Sabbath. The five odd 
days not provided for in the arrangement were made festival days. 

21 This reform was a most admirable one and must be regarded as one of the good 
outcomes of the Revolution. 



530 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

592. Attempt to abolish Christianity (Nov. 7, 1793). — The 
old calendar having been abolished, the Revolutionists next pro- 
ceeded to abolish Christianity. Some of the chiefs of the Com- 
mune of Paris declared that the Revolution should not rest until 
it had "dethroned the King of Heaven as well as the kings of 
earth." An attempt was made by the extremists to have Chris- 
tianity abolished by a decree of the National Convention ; but 
that body prudently resolved that all matters of creeds should be 
left to the decision of the people themselves. The atheistic lead- 
ers then determined to effect their purpose through the Church 
itself. They persuaded the Bishop of Paris, Gobel by name, to 
abdicate his office ; and his example was followed by many of the 
clergy throughout the country. 

The churches of Paris and of other cities were now closed, and 
the treasures of their altars and shrines confiscated to the state. 
Even the bells were melted down into cannon. The images of 
the Virgin and of the Christ were torn down, and the busts of 
Marat and other patriots set up in their stead. And as the eman- 
cipation of the world was now to be wrought not by the Cross 
but by the guillotine, that instrument took the place of the cru- 
cifix, and was called the " Holy Guillotine." In many places 
all visible symbols of the ancient religion were destroyed ; all 
emblems of hope in some cemeteries were obliterated, and over 
their gates were inscribed the words, " Death is eternal sleep." 

593. Inauguration of the Worship of Reason (Nov. 10, 1793). 
— The madness of the people culminated in the worship of 
Reason. A celebrated beauty, personating the Goddess of Reason, 
was set upon the altar of Notre Dame in Paris as an object of 
homage and worship. 

The example of Paris was followed generally throughout France. 
Churches were converted into temples of the new worship. The 
Sabbath having been abolished, the services of the temple were 
held only upon every tenth day. On that day the mayor or some 
popular leader mounted the altar and harangued the people, dwell- 
ing upon the news of the moment, the triumphs of the armies of 
the Republic, the glorious achievements of the Revolution, and 



FALL OF HEBERT AND DANTON 531 

the privilege of Eving in an era when one was oppressed neither 
by kings on earth nor by a King in Heaven. 

594. Fall of Hebert and Danton (March and April, 1794). — 
Not many months of the Reign of Terror had passed before 
the Revolutionists, having destroyed or driven into obscurity their 
common enemy, the Girondins and their sympathizers, turned 
upon one another with the ferocity of beasts whose appetite has 
been whetted by the taste of blood. 

During the progress of events the Jacobins had become divided 
into three factions, headed respectively by Danton, Robespierre, 
and Hubert. Danton had been a bold and audacious leader,^^ but 
was now adopting a more conservative tone, and was condemning 
as no longer necessary the government by terror which was being 
maintained by the Great Committee of Public Safety. 

Hubert was one of the worst demagogues of the Commune of 
Paris, the chief and instigator of the Parisian rabble. He was the 
editor of a vile and blasphemous sheet called Pere Duchesne^ the 
most audacious and inflammatory of the innumerable newspapers 
and pamphlets which appeared during the Reign of Terror. He 
and his followers would overturn everything and refound society 
upon communism and atheism. 

Robespierre occupied a position midway between these two, 
condemning alike the moderatism of Danton and the atheistic 
communism of Hebert. To make his own power supreme he 
resolved to crush both. 

Hubert and his party were the first to fall, Danton and his 
adherents working with Robespierre to bring about their ruin. 
Danton and his party were the next to follow. Little more than 
a week had passed since the execution of Hubert before Robes- 
pierre had effected their destruction on the charge of conspiring 
with the counter-revolutionists. The last words of Danton to the 
executioner were, " Show my head to the people ; they do not see 
the like every day." The grim request was granted. 

With the anarchists and moderates both destroyed, Robes- 
pierre was supreme. His ambition was attained. " He stood 
22 He was a member of the first Committee of Public Safety, but not of the second. 



532 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



alone on the awful eminence of the Holy Mountain." But his 
turn was soon to come. 

595. Worship of the Supreme Being. — One of the first acts of 
Robespierre after he had freed himself from his most virulent 
enemies was to give France a new religion in place of the worship 
of Reason. Robespierre wished to sweep away Christianity as a 
superstition, but he would stop at deism. He did not believe 
that a state could be founded on atheism. " If God did not 

exist," he declared, ''it would behoove 
man to invent Him." 

In a remarkable address delivered be- 
fore the Convention on the 7 th of May, 
1794, Robespierre eloquently defended 
the doctrines of God and 'immortality, 
and then closed his speech by offering 
for adoption this decree : "(i) The French 
people recognize the existence of the Su- 
preme Being and the immortality of the 
soul ; (2) they recognize that the worship 
most worthy of the Supreme Being is 
the practice of the duties of man; and 
(3) they put in the first rank of these 
duties to detest bad faith and tyranny, to 
punish tyrants and traitors, to rescue the 
unfortunate, to defend the oppressed, to do to others all the good 
one can, and to be unjust towards none." ^^ 

The Convention adopted the resolution with the "utmost 
enthusiasm." The Jacobins appeared by a committee before the 
Assembly and thanked them for the grand decree. Similar con- 
gratulations came from all parts of France. The churches which 
had been converted into temples of the Goddess of Reason were 
now consecrated to the new worship of the Supreme Being. 

596. The Culmination of the Terror at Paris (June and July, 
1794). — At the same time that Robespierre was instituting the 

28 Stephens, The Principal Speeches of the Statesmen and Orators qf the French 
Revolution, vol. ii, p. 416. 




Fig. 92. — Robespierre 
(From a French print) 



THE TERROR AT PARIS 533 

new worship, the Great Committee of Public Safety, of which 
he was generally regarded as the controlling spirit, was ruling 
France by a terrorism unparalleled since the most frightful days 
at Rome. The Revolutionary Tribunal had been entirely unham- 
pered in its modes of procedure, and " moral conviction " on the 
part of the judges of the guilt of a person was all that was neces- 
sary upon which to ground a verdict of death. The Convention, 
affrighted by the monster it had itself brought forth, was cowering 
before it. 

With all power thus gathered in its hands, the Committee pro- 
ceeded to overawe all opposition and dissent by the wholesale 
slaughters of the guillotine. The prisons of Paris and of the 
departments were filled with suspected persons, until two hundred 
thousand prisoners were crowded into these republican bastilles. 
At Paris the dungeons were emptied of their victims and room 
made for fresh ones by the swift processes of the Revolutionary 
Tribunal, which in mockery of justice caused the prisoners to be 
brought before its bar in companies of ten or fifty or more. Rank 
or talent was an inexpiable crime. "Were you not a noble?" 
asked the president of the tribunal of one of the accused. " Yes," 
was the reply. " Enough ; another," was the judge's verdict. And 
so on through the long list each day brought before the court. 

The scenes about the guillotine seem mirrored from the Inferno 
of Dante. Benches were arranged around the scaffold and rented 
to spectators, like seats in a theater. The market women of Paris, 
the same women who had made the march to Versailles in the 
opening days of the Revolution, and who were now known as "the 
Furies of the Guillotine," busied themselves with their knitting 
while watching the changing scenes of the bloody spectacle. In 
the space of seven weeks (June lo-July 27) the number of persons 
guillotined at Paris was thirteen hundred and seventy-six, — an 
average of over twenty-eight a day. 

597. The Terror in the Provinces Wliile such was the frightful 

state of things at the capital, matters were even worse in several 
of the provinces. Some of the cities, including Lyons, Bordeaux, 
Marseilles, and Toulon, which had been prominent centers of 



534 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



the counter-revolution incited by the arrest of the Girondins 
(sec. 586), were made a terrible example of the vengeance of the 
Revolutionists. Lyons was to them an object of special hatred. 
Respecting this place the Convention passed the following decree : 
" The city of Lyons shall be destroyed ; every house occupied by 
a rich man shall be demolished." The decree was in part actually 
carried into execution, one of the most aristocratic quarters of the 
city being pulled down. 

At Nantes, in the Vend^an district, the terror culminated. The 
agent here of the Great Committee was one Carrier. At first 
he caused his victims to be shot singly or to be guillotined ; but 
finding these methods too slow, he devised more expeditious 
modes of execution, which were known as fusillades (battues) 
and noyades (drownings). l^h.Q ftisillades consisted in gathering 
the victims in large companies and then mowing them down with 
cannon and musket. In the noyades a hundred or more persons 
were crowded into an old hulk, which was then towed out into 
the Loire and scuttled. 

By these various methods Carrier succeeded in destroying up- 
wards of five thousand persons in about four months. What renders 
these murders the more atrocious is the fact that a considerable 
number of the victims were women and little children. 

598. The Fall of Robespierre (July 28, 1794); Punishment of 
the Terrorists. — The Reign of Terror had lasted about nine 
months when a reaction came. The successes of the armies of 
the Republic and the establishment of the authority of the Con- 
vention throughout the departments caused the people to look 
upon the wholesale executions that were daily taking place as 
unnecessary and cruel. They began to turn with horror and pity 
from the scenes of the guillotine. 

Robespierre was the first to be swept away by the reaction. 
The Convention denounced him and his adherents as enemies of 
the Repubhc. He was arrested, rescued by the rabble of Paris, 
rearrested and straightway sent to the guillotine, and along with 
him several of his friends and the greater part of the members of 
the Commune of Paris. 



EFFECTS OF THE REIGN OF TERROR 535 

The reaction which had swept away Robespierre and his asso- 
ciates continued after their fall. There was a general demand 
for the punishment of the Terrorists. The clubs of the Jacobins 
were closed, and that infamous society which had rallied and 
directed the hideous rabbles of the great cities was broken up. 
The Christian worship was reestablished. The busts of Marat were 
thrown down, broken in pieces, and flung into the gutter. 

599. Effects of the Reign of Terror. — The effect of the Terror 
upon France was just what the Terrorists had aimed to produce. 
It effectually cowed all opposition at home to the Revolution, 
thereby preserving the unity of France and enabling her to push 
the foreign foe from her soil. 

Outside of France the effects of the rule by terror were most 
unfavorable to the true cause of the Revolutionists. It destroyed 
the illusions of generous souls, like Coleridge, Wordsworth, and 
Southey in England, and caused among the earlier sympathizers 
with the Revolutionists a great revulsion of feeling. From being 
Liberals men became Conservatives and determined foes of all 
innovation and reform. The Revolution was discredited in the 
eyes of its best friends. It became identified in men's minds with 
atheism and terrorism, and to the present hour in the minds of 
many the French Revolution suggests nothing save foul blas- 
phemies and guillotine horrors. 

600. Bonaparte defends the Convention (Oct. 5, 1795). — Expe- 
rience had shown the defects of the revolutionary government, 
particularly in that it united both legislative and executive power 
in the same hands. The Convention now set about framing a 
new constitution, which vested the executive power in a body 
called the Directory, consisting of five persons. It also provided 
for two legislative bodies,^* known as the Council of Five Hun- 
dred and the Council of Ancients. 

The Convention, fearing to surrender its authority into the 
hands of an entirely new assembly, had provided that two thirds 

24 The hasty and often ill-considered decrees of the Convention had shown the 
necessity of putting a check upon legislation by the creation of an Upper and a 
Lower House. 



536 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

of the representatives in the new legislature should be chosen 
from the deputies of the old body. This displeased the Parisian 
mob. The sections of the turbulent capital again gathered their 
hordes, and on the 5th of October, 1795, a mob of forty thousand 
men advanced to the attack of the Tuileries, where the Conven- 
tion was sitting. As the mob came on they were met by a " whiff 
of grapeshot," which sent them flying back in wild disorder. The 
man who trained the guns was a young artillery officer, a native 
of the island of Corsica, — Napoleon Bonaparte.^^ The Revolu- 
tion had at last brought forth a man of genius capable of con- 
trolling and directing its tremendous energies. 

V. The Directory (Oct. 27, 1795-Nov. 9, 1799) 

601. The Republic becomes Aggressive. — Under the Directory 

the Republic, which up to this time h&,d been acting mainly on 
the defensive, very soon entered upon an aggressive policy. The 
Revolution having accomplished its work in France, having there 
destroyed royal despotism and abolished class privilege, now set 
itself about fulfilling its early promise of giving liberty to all 
peoples (sec. 582). In a word, the Revolution became what has 
been called "an armed propaganda." France now exhibits what 
her historians call her social, her communicative genius. " Easily 
seduced herself," as Lamartine says, " she easily seduces others." 
She would make all Europe like unto herself. Herself a republic, 
she would make all nations republics. 

Had not the minds and hearts of the people in all the neigh- 
boring countries been prepared to welcome the new order of 
things, the Revolution could never have spread itself as widely as 
it did. But everywhere irrepressible longings for social and polit- 
ical equality and freedom, born of long oppression, were stirring 
the souls of men. The French armies were everywhere welcomed 
by the people as deliverers. Thus was France enabled to surround 

25 The Convention had intrusted its defense to the deputy Barras, who had 
selected Bonaparte as his lieutenant on account of the reputation he had made for 
himself at the siege of Toulon in 1793. 



THE PLANS OF THE DIRECTORY 537 

herself with a girdle of commonwealths. She conquered Europe 
not by her armies but by her ideas. "An invasion of armies," 
says Victor Hugo, " can be resisted : an invasion of ideas cannot 
be resisted." 

The republics established were indeed short-lived; for the times 
were not yet ripe for the complete triumph of democratic ideas. 
But a great gain for freedom was made. The reestablished mon- 
archies, as we shall see later, never dared to make themselves as 
despotic as those which the Revolution had overturned. 

602. The Plans of the Directory. — Austria and England were 
the only formidable powers that still persisted in their hostihty 
to the Republic. ^^ The Directors resolved to strike a decisive 
blow at the first of these implacable foes. To carry out their 
design, two large armies, numbering about seventy thousand 
each, were mustered upon the Middle Rhine and intrusted to 
the command of the two young and energetic generals, Moreau 
and Jourdan, who were to make a direct invasion of Germany. 
A third army, numbering about forty-two thousand men, was 
assembled in the neighborhood of Nice, in Southeastern France, 
and placed in the hands of Bonaparte, to whom was assigned the 
work of driving the Austrians out of Italy. 

603. Bonaparte's Italian Campaign (i 796-1 797). — Straight- 
way upon receiving his command, Bonaparte, now in his twenty- 
seventh year, animated by visions of military glory to be gathered 
on the fields of Italy, hastened to join his army at Nice. He 
found the. discontented soldiers almost without food or clothes. 
He at once aroused all their latent entTiusiasm by one of those 
short, stirring addresses for which he afterwards became so 
famous. "Soldiers," said he, "you are badly fed and almost 
naked. ... I have come to lead you into the most fertile fields 
of the world ; there you will find large cities, rich provinces, honor, 
glory, and wealth. Soldiers of Italy, will you fail in courage? " 

If this address be placed alongside the decree of the Conven- 
tion offering the aid of France to all peoples desiring freedom 

26 Prussia, Spain, and other states had made the Treaties of Basel with the Con- 
vention, in which they recognized the French Republic (1795). 



538 



THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 



(sec. 582), it will be realized with how alien a spirit Bonaparte 
here inspires the armies of republican France. He represents 
Italy to the imagination of the soldiers of the French Republic 
merely as a country of rich cities to be despoiled, as a land 
whence France may draw unlimited tribute. The address marks 
the beginning of that transformation which in a few years changed 
the liberating armies of France into the scourge of Europe. 

Before the mountain roads were yet free from snow Bonaparte 
set in motion his army, which he had assembled on the coast 
near Genoa, and suddenly forced the passage of the mountains 
at the juncture of the Apennines and the Maritime Alps. The 
Carthaginian had been surpassed. " Hannibal," exclaimed Bona- 
parte, " crossed the Alps ; as for us, we have turned them." 

This blow separated the Sardinian and Austrian armies. Within 
two weeks the Sardinians were completely defeated and forced to 
sue for peace. Now followed a most astonishing series of French 
victories over the Austrians.^^ As a result of the campaign a 
considerable part of Northern Italy was formed into a common- 
wealth under the name of the Cisalpine Republic. Genoa was also 
transformed into the Ligurian Republic. 

604. Treaty of Campo Formio (Oct. 17, 1797). — While Bona- 
parte had been gaining his surprising victories in Italy, Moreau 
and Jourdan had been meeting with severe reverses in Germany. 
Bonaparte, having effected the work assigned to the army of Italy, 
now climbed the Eastern Alps and marched toward Vienna. The 
near approach of the French to his capital induced the Emperor 
Francis II to listen to proposals of peace. An armistice was 
agreed upon, and later the important Treaty of Campo Formio 
was arranged. 

By the terms of this treaty Austria ceded her Belgian provinces 
to the French Republic, recognized the Rhine as the eastern 
frontier of France, and acknowledged the independence of the 
Cisalpine Republic. As an offset to her losses Austria received 

27 Among the noted engagements of the campaign were the battles of Lodi (May 
ID, 1796), Castiglione (August 5, 1796), Areola (Nov. 15-17, 1796), Rivoli (Jan. 14, 
15, 1797), and the siege of Mantua (July, 1796-February, 1797). 



BONAPARTE'S CAMPAIGN IN EGYPT 539 

the Venetian dominions, save the Ionian Islands, which were 
annexed to the French RepubHc. Bonaparte was already dazzled 
by the vision of a French empire in the Orient. The Grecian 
isles were to constitute a Hnk in the chain which should bind 
France to her prospective Eastern dependencies. 

With^ the treaty arranged, Bonaparte soon set out for Paris, 
where a triumph and ovation such as Europe had not seen since 
the days of the old Roman conquerors was accorded him. 

605. Bonaparte*s Campaign in Egypt (1798-1799). — The 
Directors had received Bonaparte with apparent enthusiasm; 
but at this very moment they were disquieted by fears lest 
their general's ambition might lead him to play the part of a 
second Caesar. They resolved to engage him in an enterprise 
which would take him out of France. This undertaking was an 
attack upon England, which they were then meditating. Bona- 
parte opposed the plan of a direct descent upon the island as 
impracticable, declaring that England should be attacked through 
her Eastern possessions. He presented a scheme very character- 
istic of his bold, imaginative genius. This was nothing less than 
the conquest and colonization of Egypt, by which means France 
would be able to control the trade of the East and cut England 
off from her East India possessions. The Directors assented to 
the plan, and with feelings of relief saw Bonaparte embark from 
the port of Toulon to carry out the enterprise. 

Evading the vigilance of the British fleet that was patrolling the 
Mediterranean, Bonaparte landed in Egypt (July i, 1798). Within 
sight of the Pyramids the French army was checked in its march 
by a determined stand of the renowned Mameluke cavalry. Bona- 
parte animated the spirits of his men for the inevitable fight by 
one of his happiest speeches. One of the sentences is memorable. 
" Soldiers," he exclaimed, pointing to the Pyramids, " forty cen- 
turies are looking down upon you." The terrific struggle that 
followed is known in history as the "batde of the Pyramids." 
Bonaparte gained a victory that opened the way for his advance. 
Cairo was now entered in triumph, and all Lower Egypt fell into 
the hands of the French. 



540 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

Bonaparte had barely made his entrance into Cairo before the 
startling intelligence was borne to him that his fleet had been 
destroyed in the bay of Abukir, at the mouth of the Nile, by 
the English admiral Nelson (August i, 1798). 

In the spring of 1799, the Ottoman Porte having sent a force 
to retake Egypt, Bonaparte led his army into Syria to fight the 
Turks there. He captured Gaza and Jaffa, and finally invested 
Acre. The Turks were assisted in the defense of this place 
by the distinguished EngHsh commodore. Sir Sidney Smith. All 
Bonaparte's efforts to carry the place by storm were in vain. " I 
missed my destiny at Acre," said Bonaparte afterwards. With 
the ports of Syria secured he might have imitated Alexander and 
led his soldiers to the foot of the Himalayas. 

Bitterly disappointed, Bonaparte abandoned the siege of Acre 
and led his army back into Egypt. There his worn and thinned 
ranks were attacked near Abukir by a fresh Turkish army, but 
the genius of Bonaparte turned threatened defeat into a brilliant 
victory. Kl^ber, one of Bonaparte's Heutenants, clasping him in 
his arms, exclaimed, " General, how great you are ! " 

606. Establishment of the Tiberine, the Helvetic, and the Par- 
thenopean Republics (i 798-1 799). — We must turn now to view 
affairs in Europe. The year 1798 was a favorable one for the 
republican cause represented by the Revolution. During that 
year and the opening month of the following one, the French 
set up three new republics. 

First, they incited an insurrection at Rome, made a prisoner 
of the Pope, and proclaimed the Roman or Tiberine Republic. 
Then, intervening in a revolution in Switzerland, they invaded 
the Swiss cantons and united them into a commonwealth under 
the name of the Helvetic Republic. A Httle later the French 
troops drove the king of Naples out of Italy to Sicily, and trans- 
formed his peninsular domains into the Parthenopean Republic. 
Thus were three new republics added to the commonwealths which 
the Revolution had previously created. 

607. The Reaction; Bonaparte overthrows the Directory (i8th 
and 19th Brumaire, 1799). — Much of this work was quickly 



THE REACTION 541 

undone. Encouraged by the victory of Nelson over the French 
fleet in the battle of the Nile, and alarmed at the aggressions of 
the government of the Directory, the leading powers of Europe, 
now including the Tsar of Russia, who was incensed against the 
French especially for their intrusion into the Orient, which the 
Russian rulers had ever regarded as their own particular sphere 
of influence, had formed a new coalition against France. 

The war began early in 1799 and was waged at one and the 
same time in Italy, in Switzerland, and in Holland. In the south 
the campaign was extremely disastrous to the French. They were 
driven out of Italy, and were barely able to keep the allies off the 
soil of France. The Cisalpine, Tiberine, and Parthenopean repub- 
lics were abolished. 

These reverses suflered by the French armies in Italy, though 
in other quarters they had been successful, caused the Direc- 
tory to fan into great disfavor. They were charged with having 
through jealousy exiled Bonaparte, the only man who could save 
the Republic. Confusion and division prevailed everywhere. The 
Royalists had become so strong and bold that there was danger 
lest they should gain control of the government. On the other 
hand, the threats of the mob of Paris began to create apprehen- 
sions of another Reign of Terror. 

News of the desperate state of affairs at home reached Bona- 
parte in Egypt, just after his return from Syria. He instantly 
formed a bold resolve. Confiding the command of the army in 
Egypt to Kl^ber, he set sail for France, disclosing his designs in 
the significant words, " The reign of the lawyers is over." 

Bonaparte was welcomed in France with the wildest enthusi- 
asm. A great majority of the people felt instinctively that the 
emergency demanded a dictator. Some of the Directors joined 
with Napoleon in a plot to overthrow the government. Meeting 
with opposition in the Council of Five Hundred, Napoleon with 
a body of grenadiers 'drove the deputies from their chamber. 

The French Revolution had at last brought forth its Cromwell 
(sec. 481). Napoleon was master of France. The first French 
Republic was at an end, and what is distinctively called the French 



542 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

Revolution was over. Now commences the history of the Consulate 
and the First Empire, — the story of that surprising career the sun 
of which rose so brightly at Austerlitz and set forever at Waterloo. 

Selections from the Sources. — Young (Arthur), Travels in France, 
is the most valuable contemporary accourit we have of the condition of 
France, particularly of the peasantry, on the eve of the Revolution. Burke, 
Reflections on the Revolution in France. Translations and Reprints, vol. i. 
No. 5, "The French Revolution, 1789-1791" (ed. by James Harvey Robin- 
son), contains (i) " Decree of the National Assembly abolishing the Feudal 
System," (2) " Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen," and 
(3) " The Civil Constitution of the Clergy " ; vol. iv, No. 5, " Tj^pical Cahiers 
of 17S9 " (ed. by Merrick Whitcomb) ; and vol. vi, No. i, " French Philoso- 
phers of the Eighteenth Century " (same editor). For additional material 
the special student should turn to Anderson, The Constitutions and Other 
Select Documents Illustrative of the History of France, i'j8g~igoi. 

Secondary Works. — For the antecedents and causes of the Revolution; 
TaiNE, The Ancie7it Regime, and Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the 
Revolution. Buckle, History of Civilization in England, vol. i, chaps, xii-xiv, 
gives an unsurpassed presentation of the philosophical and literary move- 
ment of the eighteenth century. Lowell, The Eve of the Revolution ; a series 
of scholarly and suggestive studies of the various phases of French life and 
thought during the century preceding the calling of the States-General. 

Short histories: Stephens, Revolutionary Europe, lySg-iSi^, first part. 
The most authoritative short history of the Revolution. Other excellent 
short accounts are Morris', Mallet's, Mathews', and Mignet's. 

Extended histories: Stephens,^ History of the French Revolution; 
Sybel, History of the French Revolution ; Theirs, The History of the 
French Revolution; Taine, The French Revolution; The Cambridge Mod- 
ern History, vol. viii ; and Carlyle, The French Revolution. The last 
is another of Carlyle's masterpieces ; " a prose epic " and " pictures in the 
French Revolution " are good characterizations of it. The student should 
take it up last in his readings. 

Biographies: Morley, Rousseau and Voltaire; Willert, Mirabeau; 
Lamartine, History of the Girondists ; Tarbell, Madame Roland; 
Southey, The Life of Nelson; and Rocheterie, The Life of Marie 
Antoinette. For works on Napoleon Bonaparte, see bibliography at end 
of following chapter. 

Work on special phase of the Revolution : Mahan, The Influence of 
Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire, vol. i. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The salt tax (the gabelle). 2. Rousseau. 
3. The economist Turgot. 4. Mirabeau. 5. The Marseillaise hymn. 
6. Thorvaldsen's " Lion of Lucerne." 7. Life in Paris during the Reign 
of Terror. See Stephens. 8. Marie Antoinette. 9. Madame Roland. 



CHAPTER XXXIV 



THE CONSULATE AND THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 
(1799-1815) 

I. The Consulate (i 799-1 804) 

608. The Veiled Military-Dictatorship. — After the overthrow 
of the government of the Directory, a new constitution — the 
fourth since the year 1789 — was prepared and, having been sub- 
mitted to the approval of the people, was accepted by a vote of 
over three millions to less 
than two thousand. This 
new instrument vested the 
executive power in three 
Consuls, nominated for a 
term of ten years, the first 
of whom really exercised 
all the authority of the 
board, the remaining two 
members being simply his 
counselors. Bonaparte, of 
course, became the First 
Consul. 

The other functions of 
the government were car- 
ried on by a Council of 

State, a Tribunate, a Legis- Fig. 93. — Napoleon Bonaparte. 

_, , the medallion by Isabey) 

lature, and a Senate. But 

the members of all these bodies were appointed either directly 
or indirectly by the Consuls, so that the entire government was 
actually in their hands, or rather in the hands of the First Con- 
sul. France was still called a republic, but it was such a republic 

543 




(After 



544 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

as Rome was under Julius Caesar or Augustus. The republican 
names and forms merely veiled a government as absolute and 
personal as that of Louis XIV, — in a word, a military dicta- 
torship. 

Local self-government which had been created by the Revolution 
was suppressed. In all the various subdivisions of France the First 
Consul was represented by officials appointed by himself. The 
government became more centralized than it had ever been before, 
and this character it has retairied up to the present time. 

609. Causes of England's Hostility to Bonaparte. — Bonaparte 
inherited from the Directory war with Austria and England. To 
both he offered peace. Austria, which was asked to give up 
Lombardy, recently reconquered from the Republic, courteously 
declined his proposals. England, with rasping words, rejected the 
proffered hand of reconciliation. 

There were several reasons for England's refusal to recognize 
the government of the First Consul. In the first place, the Eng- 
lish minister Pitt declined to make peace with Bonaparte because 
he believed he represented the Jacobin element of the Revolution, 
and that his government would be violent and hence unstable. 
Again, judging from Bonaparte's acts as a general of the Directory, 
Pitt did not think that he could be trusted. 

But the deeper motive of England's inextinguishable hostility 
to Bonaparte, not only as First Consul but also as Emperor, can 
be understood only as we view the Anglo-French phase of the 
wars of the Napoleonic era as a continuation of that second 
Hundred Years' War between France and England of which we 
gave some account in an earlier chapter (Chapter XXXI). 

The seizure by France of the Austrian Netherlands — which 
gave her possession of Antwerp, the possible rival of London — 
and her intrusion into the Mediterranean alarmed England. A 
French empire dominating the European Continent and controlling 
the Mediterranean — Napoleon openly declared that " the Medi- 
terranean was destined by nature to be a French lake" — was 
incompatible with England's commercial and trade supremacy 
in the world at large. In the Napoleonic wars England fought 



WARS OF THE FIRST CONSUL 545 

to maintain that ascendancy which the wars of the eighteenth 
century with her great rival had secured for her, 

610. War of the First Consul against Austria; Marengo and 
Hohenlinden; Peace of Luneville (1801). — Offers of peace to 
Austria and England having been rejected, Bonaparte mustered 
his armies. His plan was to deal Austria, his only formidable 
Continental enemy, a double blow.. A large army was collected 
on the Rhine for an invasion of Germany. This- was intrusted to 
Moreau. Another, intended to operate against the Austrians in 
Italy, was gathered with great secrecy at the foot of the Alps. 
Bonaparte himself assumed command of this latter force. 

In the spring of the year 1800 Bonaparte made his memo- 
rable passage of the Alps by the Great St. Bernard Pass, and 
astonished the Austrian generals by suddenly appearing in Pied- 
mont at the head of an army of forty thousand men. Upon the 
renowned field of Marengo the Austrian army, which greatly 
outnumbered that of the French, was completely overwhelmed, 
and North Italy lay for a second time at the feet of Bonaparte. 
The Cisalpine Republic was now reestablished. 

But at the moment Italy was regained Egypt was lost. On 
the very day of the battle of Marengo, Kl^ber, whom Bonaparte 
had left in charge of the army in Egypt (sec. 607), was assas- 
sinated by a Mohammedan fanatic, and shortly afterwards the 
entire French force was obliged to surrender to the English. 

The French reverses in Egypt, however, were soon made up by 
fresh victories in Europe. A few months after the battle of 
Marengo, Moreau gained a decisive victory over the Austrians 
at Hohenlinden, which opened the way to Vienna. The Emperor 
Francis II was now constrained to sign a treaty of peace at 
Luneville (Feb. 9, 1801). The most important part of the treaty 
was that which provided for the reconstruction of the Germanic 
body. But as this reorganization of Central Europe was not com- 
pleted until after the battle of Austerlitz, we shall defer further 
explanation of it until we reach that important event (sec. 620). 

611. The Peace of Amiens with England (March 27, 1802). 
— The year following the peace between France and Austria, 



546 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

England also signed the Peace of Amiens. In this treaty England 
acquiesced in the situation which France had created on the 
Continent, restored all the colonies (save the islands of Trinidad 
and Ceylon) which she had taken from France and her allies, — the 
Protestant Netherlands and Spain, — and agreed conditionally to 
withdraw from the island of Malta, which was one of the most 
important naval stations in the Mediterranean. France on her 
part agreed to withdraw her forces from Naples and the Papal 
States, and to recognize the independence of the Ionian Islands. ^ 

All these provisions of the treaty show how largely commercial 
and colonial were the interests which had set the two rival nations 
in such mutual antagonism. 

612. Bonaparte attempts to reestablish the French Colonial Em- 
pire in the West. — Peace with England gave France the freedom 
of the sea and enabled the First Consul to pursue his favorite pro- 
ject at this time of the restoration of the French colonial empire 
in the West. 

Bonaparte had already taken one important step towards this 
end. After his successful campaign against Austria in Italy he 
had taken the Grand Duchy of Tuscany from its Austrian prince, 
renamed it the Kingdom of Etruria, and given it to a Spanish 
Infante, in return for which Spain had ceded to France Louisiana 
in the New World (1800). Thus France was once more in pos- 
session of a large portion of the North American mainland. 

By the Treaty of Amiens she had regained her island colonies 
in the West Indies. The western part of the important island of 
Haiti, however, which once belonged to France, had been lost 
during the Revolution by a successful revolt of the negroes and 
mulattoes against the whites.^ In imitation of the motherland 
the seH- emancipated blacks had set up a republic. Napoleon now 
sent an army of twenty thousand men to reconquer the island. 
The French troops were successful at first, but in the end the 



1 These islands had been taken from France by Russia and Turkey in 1798 and 
erected into an independent state under their joint guardianship. 

2 The leader of the revolt was the celebrated Toussaint Louverture, one of the 
most remarkable men ever produced by the black race. 



BONAPARTE AS AN ENLIGHTENED DESPOT 547 

entire force was virtually destroyed by fever and the weapons of 
the blacks. 

613. Bonaparte as an Enlightened Despot ; the Regeneration of 
France ; the Civil Code At this time were also begun by Bona- 
parte many of those domestic reforms and undertakings which 
were continued throughout the period of his domination, and 
which concerned almost every phase of the material, social, intel- 
lectual, religious, and civil life of France. It was his work here 
which constitutes his true title to fame. He was, in the words 
of his biographer Professor Sloane, "one of the greatest social 
reformers of the world." 

We shall best understand Bonaparte in his role as a reformer, 
and best determine his place in history, if we regard him as the 
successor of the benevolent despots of the eighteenth century. 
His mission was to carry on and perfect their work and to con- 
summate the reforms and to organize and make secure the social 
results of the Revolution. 

To close the wounds inflicted upon France by the Revolution 
was one of the first aims of Bonaparte. Already the Royalist exiles 
had been invited to return. Forty thousand families came back, 
and many of the old supporters of the Bourbons now entered the 
service of the First Consul. The prison doors were thrown open. 
The past was forgotten and forgiven. There were no longer to 
be parties ; all were to be simply Frenchmen. These wise meas- 
ures of amnesty did much towards restoring confidence and 
bringing back internal peace and prosperity to France 

But the deepest wound given France by the Revolution was the 
schism created by the Civil Constitution of the Clergy (sec. 571). 
This had divided the nation into two bitterly opposed parties. 
Moreover, since 1794 the government had ceased to pay the 
salaries of the priests, with the result that many communes were 
wholly without regular religious services. To remedy this state 
of things Bonaparte entered into an agreement with the holy see 
known as the Concordat (July 15, 1801). The First Consul was 
to appoint archbishops and bishops impartially from both parties, 
that is, the party which had acquiesced in the revolutionary 



548 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

programme and the party which had opposed it, and the state was 
again to assume as a pubHc charge the salaries of the clergy.^ 
The Pope was to be recognized as the head of the French Church, 
and was to confirm in their ecclesiastical offices the persons 
appointed by the government. The Concordat closed the great 
breach which the Revolution had opened in the French Church, 
and attached the Catholics to the government of the First Consul. 

Not less successful was Bonaparte in his efforts to restore those 
material interests of the country which had suffered greatly dur- 
ing the Revolution. He repaired and constructed roads and 
bridges, dug canals, opened the rivers to navigation, and improved 
the seaports of the country. The great military roads which he 
caused to be constructed over the Alps are marvels of engineering 
skill, and served as a chief means of communication between 
Italy and the north of Europe until the mountains were pierced 
with tunnels. 

The public buildings and monuments of France had fallen 
into decay. Bonaparte restored the old and built new ones. 
He embellished Paris and the other chief cities of France with 
public edifices and memorial monuments of every description. 
Many of these works are the pride of France at the present day. 

Education was not neglected. By the establishment of schools 
and the endowment of libraries, museums, and art galleries, and 
by the creation finally of the University of France, Bonaparte 
gave an impulse to the educational system which is felt at the 
present time, and which has done much to secure for the French 
people the preeminent place they hold to-day in the world of art, 
science, and letters. It is to be borne in mind, however, that 
in this field the First Consul built upon foundations which had 
been laid by the Convention. 

But the most noteworthy, the most enduring, and the most 
far-reaching in its influence upon civilization of all the works 

3 This arrangement held good for over one hundred years. The salaries of all 
the French clergy were paid out of the public treasury. In 1905, however, the rela- 
tions between Church and State became very strained and in December resulted 
in the Separation Law which expressly abolished the Concordat and marked the 
final separation of Church and State in France. 



BONAPARTE BECOMES CONSUL FOR LIFE 549 

of Napoleon Bonaparte, either as First Consul or as Emperor, 
was the compilation of what is known as the Civil Code, or Code 
Napoleon, which has caused his name to be joined with that of 
Justinian as one of the great lawgivers of history. 

The compiling of this Code was one of the earliest under- 
takings of the First Consul. Almost immediately after coming 
to power he appointed a commission of five eminent jurists to 
take up the work, which had already been begun by the Con- 
stituent Assembly and the Convention.* These experts were 
busied with the labor for about four years (i 800-1 804). Bona- 
parte himself often met with them and assisted in the work by 
sagacious criticism and suggestion. 

The Code was made up of the ancient customs of France, of 
Roman law maxims, and particularly of the principles and the 
legislation of the Revolution. This great mass of material was 
condensed, harmonized, and revised in some such way as the 
jurists of the Emperor Justinian handled the accumulated mass 
of law material — old and new, pagan and Christian — of their 
time, in the creation of the celebrated Corpus Juris Civilis. 

The influence of the Civil Code upon the development of 
Liberalism in Western Europe was most salutary. It secured 
the work of the Revolution. It swept away the old unequal, 
iniquitous, oppressive customs, regulations, decrees, and laws 
that were an inheritance from. the feudal ages. It recognized 
the equality of noble and peasant in the eye of the law. Either 
its principles or its direct provisions were soon introduced into 
half of the countries of Europe. 

614. Bonaparte becomes Consul for Life (August, 1802); Crea- 
tion of the Legion of Honor. — Through the Senate and the Coun- 
cil of State, in which bodies the majority of the members were 
wholly subservient to Bonaparte, it was now proposed to the 
French people that he should be made Consul for life, in order 

4 It is now recognized that the Code was not so novel a thing as some writers have 
represented it as being. Code making was a favorite work of the enlightened despots 
(e.g. Catherine the Great of Russia, the Emperor Joseph II of Austria, Frederick 
the Great of Prussia, etc.). The Civil Code is almost an exact transcript of the 
Projet du code civil prepared by Cambac6rfes for the Convention. 



550 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

that his magnificent projects of restoration and reform might be 
pursued without interruption. With almost a single voice the 
people approved the proposal.^ Thus did the First Consul move 
a step nearer the imperial throne. From this time on Bonaparte, 
imitating a royal custom, used only his first name. Napoleon, 
and it is by this name, which was destined to fill such a great 
place in history, that we shall hereafter know him. 

It was at just this time that Napoleon established the Legion 
of Honor, an order designed to take the place of the old feudal 
orders which had been abolished by the Revolution. Preeminent 
public service, either in military or in civil life, was to be the 
passport to membership in the new society. The creation of this 
order gave offense to many of the more thoroughgoing repub- 
licans, who looked upon it as an ominous departure from the 
principle of social equahty established by the Revolution. 

615. Plot against Napoleon's Life; Execution of the Duke of 
Enghien (March 21, 1804). — The year following the conferring 
of these new powers and dignities upon Napoleon, a Royalist 
plot was laid for his assassination. The conspiracy was abetted 
by certain English officials,^ war having been renewed between 
France and Great Britain. The plot was thwarted by timely dis- 
covery. The Duke of Enghien, a Bourbon prince in whose inter- 
est it was suspected the conspiracy had been formed, was, in 
gross violation of international la\y, seized by Napoleon's soldiers 
at Ettenheim, in Baden, carried to Vincennes, hastily condemned 
to death by a midnight miHtary commission, and in the gray of 
the morning shot by the side of an open grave, — which had been 
dug before sentence was passed. 

No act of Napoleon's has been more severely censured than 
this, for the young prince was very generally regarded as inno- 
cent of any participation in the plot. To say nothing of the 
lawlessness and criminality of the act. Napoleon could have 



5 There is a most extraordinary unanimity in the plebiscites, or popular votes, 
of this period. The present measure was carried by a vote, in round numbers, of 
3,500,000 to 8000. 

6 See Rose, Life of Napoleon, vol. i, pp. 416-418. 



ESTABLISHMENT OF THE EMPIRE 



551 



done nothing more impolitic. It foreshadowed Waterloo. "Two 
actions," writes Chateaubriand in his Memoirs, "both bad, began 
and caused Napoleon's fall, — the death of the Due d'Enghien 
and the war with Spain " (sec. 630). 

The high-handed proceeding contributed to the calling into 
existence of a formidable coaHtion of the powers of Europe 
against Napoleon, of which we shall soon have occasion to speak. 

II. The Napoleonic Empire (1804-1815); the War 
OF Liberation 

616. The Restoration of the Empire of Charlemagne (May 18, 
1804). — The above conspiracy and the increased activity of the 
enemies of the First Consul resulted in a movement to increase 
his power and to insure his safety and the stability of his govern- 
ment by placing him upon a throne. Napoleon, while seeming 
to resign himself to the popular movement, really incited and 
directed it. A decree of the Senate conferring upon him the 
title of Emperor of the French having been submitted to the 
people for approval, was ratified by an almost unanimous vote. 

The coronation took place in the cathedral of Notre Dame in 
Paris, Dec. 2, 1804, Pope Pius VII having been induced to come 
from Rome to take part in the ceremonies. The presence of the 
Pope was desired by Napoleon because it was his design to have 
himself regarded not as the successor of the Bourbons but as 
the successor of Charlemagne and the Caesars, and it had always 
been thought necessary, by many at least, that the candidate for 
the imperial dignity should be consecrated to his office by the 
Roman pontiff. The Pope poured the holy oil upon the head of 
the kneeling Emperor and girded him with the imperial scepter ; 
but when he would have placed the crown upon his head. Napo- 
leon checked him, and, taking the diadem from the Pope, crowned 
himself with his own hands. 

What portion of the spirit of the old divine-right monarchies 
entered into the new French Empire may be inferred from the 
doctrines which in less than a year after Napoleon's coronation 



552 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

the subservient French clergy were teaching the youth of France. 
" The Emperor is the minister and the power of God, and his 
image on earth," ran the new catechism; "to honor and serve 
him is to honor and serve God." 

617. The Republics created by the Revolution are changed into 
Kingdoms. — The French Republic was now completely metamor- 
phosed into an unveiled Empire. Napoleon had taken up his 
residence in the palace of the Tuileries and was creating a court 
as much as possible like the court of the Bourbons. 

The original Republic having been thus transformed, we may 
be sure that the cluster of republics which during the Revolution 
had been raised up around it will speedily undergo a like trans- 
formation; for Napoleon was right when he said that a revolu- 
tion in France is sure to be followed by a revolution throughout 
Europe. As France a republic would make all states republics, 
so France a monarchy would make all nations monarchies. Within 
two years from the time that the French government assumed 
an imperial form, three of the surrounding republics raised up 
by the revolutionary ideas and armies of France had been trans- 
formed into states with monarchical governments dependent upon 
the French Empire or had been incorporated with France. In 
a word, all these states now became practically the fiefs of Napo- 
leon's empire, the provinces and dependencies of a new Rome. 

Thus the Cisalpine or Italian Republic was changed into a 
kingdom, and Napoleon, crowning himself at Milan with the 
" Iron Crown " of the Lombards,' assumed the government of the 
state, with the title of King of Italy (May, 1805) . A little later in 
the same year the Emperor incorporated the Ligurian Republic 
with the French Empire (June, 1805). Then he remodeled the 
Batavian Republic into the kingdom of Holland and conferred 
the crown upon his favorite brother Louis (May, 1806). 

Thus was the pohtical work of the Revolution undone. Political 
liberty was taken away. " I set it aside," said Napoleon, "when 
it obstructed my road." Civil equality was left. 

7 Here again Napoleon imitated Charlemagne. He said, " I am Charlemagne, for 
like Charlemagne I unite the crowns of France and Lombardy." Compare sec. 74. 



THE EMPIRE AND THE MONARCHIES 553 

618. The Empire and the Old Monarchies. — It will not be 
supposed that the powers of Europe were looking quietly on 
while France was thus transforming herself and all the neigh- 
boring countries. The colossal power which the soldier of for- 
tune was building up was a menace to all Europe. The Empire 
was more dreaded than the Republic, because it was a military 
despotism, and as such was an instrument of irresistible power 
in the hands of a man of such genius and resources as Napoleon. 
Coalition after coalition, of which England was " the paymaster," 
was formed by the sovereigns of Europe against the " usurper," 
with the object at first of pushing France back within her original 
boundaries, and then later of deposing Napoleon as the disturber 
of the peace of Europe and the oppressor of the nations. 

From the coronation of Napoleon in 1804 until his final down- 
fall in 1815 the tremendous struggle went on almost without 
intermission. It was the war of the giants. Europe was shaken 
from end to end with such armies as the world had not seen 
since the days of Xerxes. Napoleon, whose hands were upheld 
by a score of distinguished marshals, performed the miracles of 
genius. His brilliant achievements still dazzle, while they amaze, 
the world. 

To relate in detail the campaigns of Napoleon from Austerlitz 
to Waterloo would require the space of volumes. We shall simply 
indicate in a few brief paragraphs the successive steps by which 
he mounted to the highest pitch of power and fame, and then 
trace hurriedly the decline and fall of his astonishing fortunes. 

619. Napoleon's Preparations for invading England; the sale 
of Louisiana to the United States; the Camp at Boulogne (1803- 
1805). — Even while the transactions which we have recorded 
were taking place, the air was filled with notes of preparation 
for war. The Peace of Amiens between France and England 
(sec. 611) proved merely a short truce; even before Napoleon's 
coronation war had been renewed between the two countries. 

One of Napoleon's first acts of preparation for the coming 
struggle was the sale (in 1803) to the United States, for fifteen 
million dollars, of the territory of Louisiana, which he had so 



554 THE ^NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

recently acquired from Spain (sec. 612). He was impelled to 
do this because his inferiority at sea made it impossible for him 
to defend such remote possessions. 

The sale and purchase of this immense region of boundless 
resources, looked at in relation to its consequences, was one of 
the most important transactions in history. Napoleon's intuition 
seems to have revealed to him its significance for the develop- 
ment of the great American Republic. " I have given England a 
rival," he said, "which sooner or later will humble her pride." 

As early as 1803 Napoleon had begun to mass a great army at 
Boulogne, on the English Channel, and to build an immense 
number of flat-bottomed boats preparatory to an invasion of 
England. " Carthage must be destroyed," was the menacing and 
persistent cry of the French press. " Masters of the Channel for 
six hours," said Napoleon, "and we are masters of the world." * 

It is worth while in this connection to call to mind the fact that 
the American inventor, Robert Fulton, laid before Napoleon his 
invention of propelling vessels by steam at just the time when the 
Emperor was making his preparations for the invasion of Eng- 
land. Napoleon seems to have seen nothing in the invention. 
"Never," writes the contemporary Pasquier, "was he more badly 
served by his instincts. What might he not have been able to 
accomplish had he been the first to avail himseK of this new means 
of reaching his most mortal enemy." 

620. Campaign against Austria : Austerlitz (Dec. 2, 1805). — 
Napoleon's menacing preparations for the invasion of England 
produced throughout the island an alarm unequaled by anything 
the English people had experienced since the days of the Span- 
ish Armada. The navy and the army were both put in a state 
of readiness to ward off the impending blow. The younger Pitt, 

8 It is one of the open questions of history whether Napoleon ever had any serious 
intention of making a descent upon England. In the opinion of many, all these 
elaborate preparations were simply designed by Napoleon as a cover under which he 
might, without exciting suspicion, raise and equip an army intended from the first to 
be used against a wholly different foe. It is Captain Mahan's opinion, however, that 
Napoleon really intended to strike a blow at London. See his Life of Nelson (Boston, 
1897), vol. ii, chap. xx. 



THE REORGANIZATION OF GERMANY 



55S 




at this time head of the English government, was untiring in 
fostering a new coalition of the powers against France. Early in 
the year 1805 England and Russia formed an alliance which was 
intended to constitute the nucleus of a general European league. 
Austria and other states soon joined 
the coalition. 

Intelligence reaching Napoleon that 
both the Austrian and the Russian 
armies were on the move, he suddenly 
broke up the camp at Boulogne, flung 
his Grand Army, as it was called, across 
the Rhine, outmaneuvered and cap- 
tured a great Austrian army at Ulm, 
and then marched in triumph through 
Vienna to the field of Austerlitz beyond,- 
where he gained one of his most mem- 
orable victories over the combined 
armies of Austria and Russia, number- 
ing more than eighty thousand men. 
Austria was now shorn of large tracts 
of her dominions,® including Venetia, 
which Napoleon added to the king- 
dom of Italy. 

621. The Reorganization of Germany; the Confederation of the 
Rhine; End of the Holy Roman Empire (1806). — That recon- 
struction of the Germanic body which Napoleon had begun after 
the battles of Marengo and Hohenlinden (sec. 610) was now 
substantially completed, save as regards Prussia and Hanover. 
Napoleon's guiding principle here was to create in Western 
Germany a small number of states which should be bound to him- 
self by selfish interests and strong enough to be useful as allies, 
and which should constitute barrier states between France on the 
one side and Austria and Prussia on the other. Both of these 
latter states were to be kept weak and dependent upon France. 

9 The Treaty of Pressburg (Dec. 26, 1805) arranged affairs between Austria and 
France. 



Fig. 94. — William Pitt, 
Son of William Pitt, 
Earl of Chatham 
(After a painting by 
Thomas Gainsborough) 



556 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

In pursuance of this plan Napoleon ultimately reduced the 
three hundred and more states comprising the Germanic system 
to about forty. It was the ecclesiastical states, the free imperial 
cities, and the petty states of the minor princes which suffered 
extinction, their lands being bestowed upon the princes of the 
states selected for survival. Among the rulers especially favored 
at this time were the Elector of Bavaria and the Duke of Wiir- 
temberg, both of whom were made kings and given enough terri- 
tory to enable them to maintain becomingly this new dignity. 
The Margrave of Baden was also made a grand duke, and his 
dominions were enlarged. All these princes formed marriage 
alliances with the family of Napoleon. 

These favored states, together with others, — sixteen in all, — 
now declared themselves independent of the old Holy Roman 
Empire, and were formed into a league called the Confederation 
of the Rhine, with Napoleon as Protector ^'^ (July 12, 1806). 

Napoleon now absolved the feudatories of the Holy Roman 
Empire from their allegiance to the imperial crown. This action, 
taken in connection with the withdrawal of the Rhenish states, 
effected the complete break-up of the ancient Empire. Emperor 
Francis II, recognizing that his office was virtually abolished, now 
laid down the imperial crown (August 6, 1806), and henceforth 
used as his highest title Francis /, Emperor of Austria y^ 

Thus did the Holy Roman Empire come to an end, after 
having maintained an existence, since its revival under Charle- 
magne, of almost exactly one thousand years. Reckoning from 
its establishment by Caesar Augustus, it had lasted over eighteen 
hundred years, thus being one of the longest-lived of human 
institutions, — if mere existence may be reckoned as life. 

622. Good Results of Napoleon's Reorganization of Germany. — 
Napoleon's reorganization of the Germanic body, arbitrary and 
personal though his action was, proved ultimately of great import 



10 The Confederation came ultimately to embrace thirty-seven states, with a pop- 
ulation of about fifteen millions. 

11 He had already assumed this title in August, 1804, just after Napoleon's coro- 
nation as Emperor. 



TRAFALGAR 55/ 

to the German folk. It marked the beginning of the remarkable 
development of the German Empire. Out of the new German 
system which Napoleon created was to rise the later German 
Empire. Hence we may regard Napoleon's reconstruction of 
Central Europe as one of the most important, in its far-reaching 
consequences, of all his ac-ts. 

An immediate benefit conferred upon the states of the Con- 
federation of the Rhine was the introduction into them of all the 
reforms which had regenerated France and made her strong. 
Serfdom was abolished where it still lingered; equality of the 
noble and the non-noble classes before the law was established ; 
and the new French Civil Code was partly put in force. This 
meant the broadening and the carrying out of the work begun, 
and in part accomplished, in some of these German states by the 
benevolent despots of the eighteenth century. 

623. Trafalgar (Oct. 21, 1805). — Napoleon's brilliant victo- 
ries in Germany were clouded by an irretrievable disaster to his 
fleet, which occurred on the day following the surrender of the 
Austrians at Ulm. Lord Nelson having met, near Cape Trafalgar 
on the coast of Spain, the combined French and Spanish fleets, 

— Spain was at this time Napoleon's ally, — almost completely 
destroyed the combined armaments. The gallant English admiral 
fell at the moment of victory. 

This decisive battle gave England the control of the sea and 
relieved her from all danger of a French invasion. Even the 
"wet ditch," as Napoleon was wont contemptuously to call the 
English Channel, was henceforth an impassable gulf to his ambi- 
tion. He might rule the Continent, but the sovereignty of Xhe 
ocean and its islands was denied him. 

624. Campaign against Prussia: Jena and Auerstadt (1806). 

— Prussia was the next state after Austria to feel the weight of 
Napoleon's hand. King Frederick William III, following the dic- 
tates of selfish prudence, had thus far held aloof from the coali- 
tions against Napoleon, and had profited greatly by such a policy. 
He had remained inactive while Austria was being beaten to the 
ground ; but realizing at last the perfidious character of the man 



558 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

with whom he was dealing, and goaded by insuiTerable insult, he 
recklessly threw down the gauntlet to the victor of Austerlitz. 

Moving with his usual swiftness, Napoleon overwhelmed the 
Prussian armies in the battles of Jena and Auerstadt, which were 
both fought on the same day (Oct. 14, 1806). The greater part 
of Prussia was now quickly overrun by the French armies. The 
Prussian generals, at least most of them, exhibited the most 
incredible incapacity and cowardice. Strong fortresses were sur- 
rendered without a blow being struck in their defense. The 
capital, Berlin, was entered by the French in triumph. 

The sword of the great Frederick, the famous car of victory 
over the Brandenburg Gate at Berlin, together with many treasures 
stolen from the museums and art galleries of the city, were carried 
as trophies to Paris. 

625. Campaigns against the Russians: Eylau and Friedland 
(1807). — The Russian army, which the Tsar Alexander had 
sent to the aid of Frederick William, was still in the field against 
Napoleon in the Prussian territories east of the Vistula. 

Early in the year 1807 Napoleon attacked, on a stormy winter 
day, the Russian forces at Eylau. The battle was sanguinary and 
indecisive, each army, it is estimated, leaving over thirty thousand 
dead and wounded on the snow. During the summer campaign 
of the same year Napoleon again engaged the Russians in the 
terrible batde of Friedland and completely overwhelmed them. 
The Tsar was constrained to sue for peace. 

626. The Treaty of Tilsit (July 7, 1807) ; the Partition of the 
World. — Napoleon arranged a series of interviews with the Tsar 
Alexander at Tilsit. The first of the meetings took place on a 
raft moored midway in the Niemen, the frontier river of Russia. 

These interviews between Napoleon and Alexander mark one 
of the most dramatic situations in European history. The old 
order of things had been destroyed and a new order of things was 
being projected. The subject of converse of the two emperors 
was nothing less than the partition of the world between them. 
"Napoleon spread before the eyes of the Emperor of Russia his 
favorite conception of the reestabHshment of the old empires of 



THE TREATY OF TILSIT 559 

the East and the West. They were to be faithful aUies. France 
was to be the supreme power over the Latin races and in the 
center of Europe; Russia was to represent the Greek Empire 
and to expand into Asia. These grandiose views charmed the 
Emperor Alexander, who believed that in adopting them he was 
following out the policy of Peter the Great and of the Empress 
Catherine. The one enemy to be feared and crushed, according 
to Napoleon, was England." ^^ 

Thus the modern world was to be made over on the old Romano- 
Byzantine model. AH the special understandings arrived at by 
the two emperors looked to the realization of this magnificent 
conception. Several states were marked out for dismemberment 
or extinction. Russia had already absorbed the greater part of 
Poland. The Tsar Alexander was now encouraged by Napoleon 
to take Finland from Sweden and the Danubian provinces from 
Turkey. Napoleon promised to aid him in carrying out this part 
of the programme. In return the Tsar agreed to close the ports 
of Russia against English goods and to cede to France the 
Ionian Isles. ^^ 

As regards Poland and Prussia the interests of the two emperors 
clashed. It would have been to the advantage of Napoleon to 
restore the dismembered Polish nation, but he could not do this 
without alienating the Tsar Alexander ; so he merely organized 
the greater part of Prussian Poland — he gave a portion of it to 
the Tsar - — into what he named the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, and 
bestowed it upon the vassal king of Saxony.^* 

Thus were the hopes of the Polish patriots sacrificed upon the 
altar of Napoleon's imperial ambitions. Here was a nation of 
fifteen miUion souls which had been partitioned by brigand kings 
like a herd of cattle. The patriot Poles, who with pathetic devo- 
tion had followed Napoleon to every battlefield of the Consulate 
and the Empire, looked to him to unite and restore their nation. 
He had allowed them to hope that he would do so. Never were 

12 Stephens, Revolutionary Europe, iy8q-i8i3, p. 249. 

13 See sec. 611, n. i. 

14 Napoleon had made the Elector of Saxony a king just after the battle of Jena. 



56o THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

hopes more cruelly disappointed. Had Napoleon here acted the 
part of a real liberator, he would have undone one of the greatest 
wrongs of which history knows, and in the gratitude of a redeemed 
and valiant nation would have raised for himself an enduring 
monument as one of the greatest benefactors of humanity. 

As to Prussia, Napoleon was minded to erase it from the map 
of Europe. The intercession of the Tsar Alexander, however, 
saved the state from total extinction.-^^ But neither the Tsar's 
mediation in behalf of his ally, Frederick William III, nor the 
personal entreaties of the beautiful and patriotic Queen Louisa, 
who humiliated herself by appearing as a suppliant before Napo- 
leon at Tilsit, availed to save the monarchy from dismemberment 
and the deepest abasement. 

Besides stripping Prussia of her Polish provinces Napoleon 
took away from her all her territories west of the Elbe, out of 
which, in connection with some other lands, he made the new 
kingdom of Westphalia, and gave it to his brother Jerome. This 
kingdom, into the making of which went twenty-four principalities 
and free cities, Napoleon now added to the Confederation of 
the Rhine. 

Prussia thus lost fully one half of her territory. What was left 
became virtually a province of Napoleon's empire. The mutilated 
and exhausted state was forced to pay an enormous war indem- 
nity, which finally mounted up to a thousand million francs, to 
meet the cost of a great French army of occupation and to fur- 
nish a contingent for the French army whenever called upon by 
Napoleon to do so. 

627. The Continental Blockade; the Berlin and Milan Decrees 
(1806-1807). — After the Peace of Tilsit, England was Napo- 
leon's sole remaining enemy. The means which he employed to 
compass the ruin of this formidable and obstinate foe, the pay- 
master of the coalitions which he was having constantly to face, 
affords the key to the history of the great years from 1807 to the 

15 Alexander wished to maintain Prussia as a barrier state between Russia and 
Napoleon's empire. He viewed with apprehension the advance of Napoleon's frontier 
towards the western boundary of his own domains. 



i 



THE CONTINENTAL BLOCKADE 561 

final downfall of Napoleon at Waterloo in 18 15. These means 
were what is known as the Continental Blockade or System. A 
very brief retrospect will make the situation clear. 

We have seen how the English Admiral Nelson destroyed the 
alKed French and Spanish fleets at Trafalgar (sec. 623). The 
effect of this victory upon European history can hardly be exag- 
gerated. "Trafalgar was not only the greatest naval victory, it 
was the greatest and most momentous victory won either by land 
or by sea during the whole of the revolutionary war. No victory, 
and no series of victories, of Napoleon produced the same effect 
upon Europe. . . . The prospect of crushing the British navy, so 
long as England had the means to equip a navy, vanished. Napo- 
leon henceforth set his hopes on exhausting England's resources, 
by compelhng every state on the Continent to exclude her com- 
merce. Trafalgar forced him to impose his yoke upon all Europe, 
or to abandon the hope of conquering Great Britain. . . . Nel- 
son's last triumph left England in such a position that no means 
remained to injure her but those which must result in the ultimate 
deliverance of the Continent y^^ 

As we have just intimated, the history of the remaining years 
of Napoleon's domination is hardly more than a commentary 
upon these words. 

Alleging violations by England of the law of nations respecting 
the trade of neutrals and the right of blockade. Napoleon by two 
celebrated edicts, called from the cities whence they were issued 
the Berlin and Milan decrees, closed all the ports' of the Con- 
tinent against English ships, and forbade any of the European 
nations from holding any intercourse with Great Britain, all of 
whose ports he declared to be in a state of blockade. All ships 
engaging in trade with her were made subject to capture. All 
English subjects wherever found were to be made prisoners of 
war and their property confiscated.^^ 

16 Fyffe, History of Modern Eurofe, vol. i, p. 28; quoted by Mahan, The Infiu- 
ence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire, vol ii, p. 196. 

17 England replied to these decrees by so-called Orders in Council (Jan. 7, 1807, 
and Nov. 11 1807), whereby vessels trading between ports from which Napoleon had 
excluded English ships were made subject to capture as lawful war prizes. 



562 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

The policy thus adopted by Napoleon to ruin England was a 
suicidal one, and resulted finally in the ruin of his own empire. 
English trad*ers indeed suffered some severe losses, while the 
retaliatory measures adopted by the English government contrib- 
uted to involve it in an unfortunate war with the United States ; ^^ 
yet on the whole England was rather benefited than injured by 
the Continental System, for since Napoleon was practically with- 
out a navy, the blockade could not be made effective, and immense 
quantities of English goods were smuggled into the continental 
ports and sold at high prices. Even Napoleon's own soldiers 
were sometimes clad in English-made clothes and shod with 
English-made shoes. 

On the other hand, the effect upon the trade and commerce of 
the continental states was simply ruinous. Every trading center 
seethed with suppressed anger. "The hurling of twenty kings 
from their thrones," writes Napoleon's secretary, Bourrienne, 
"would have produced less hatred." 

628. The English seize the Danish Fleet (September, 1807). 
— Events of great moment, all connected directly with Napo- 
leon's Continental Blockade, now tread closely one upon the 
heels of another. 

A part of the understanding between Napoleon and Alexander 
at Tilsit was that Napoleon should seize upon Denmark and Por- 
tugal and appropriate their fleets, in order that he might be able to 
carry on more effectively his commercial war with Great Britain. 
In this contemplated action no regard was paid to the fact that 
both these countries were neutral states. 

The English ministers got information respecting this secret 
article of the Tilsit treaty. The situation in the North was already 
serious for the English. The Directory in taking possession of the 
Dutch Netherlands had got control of the Dutch trade. Napo- 
leon's campaign against Prussia had resulted in his getting actual 
or virtual possession of all the ports of North Germany. Should 
he now be allowed to seize Denmark he would be able to control 
absolutely the commerce of the Baltic Sea. 

18 The War of iSi2-i8u^ 



NAPOLEON SEIZES PORTUGAL 563 

The English government resolved to forestall Napoleon by 
seizing the Danish fleet. An EngHsh squadron descended upon 
the Danish capital, Copenhagen, and demanded of the astonished 
Danes the surrender of all their ships and naval stores. It was 
explained by the English officials that the fleet and stores would 
be held by England merely as a "deposit," and- would be given 
,back at the end of the war with France. 

The Danes indignantly refused to give up their ships. There- 
upon the English bombarded Copenhagen, destroying over eigh- 
teen hundred of the houses of the city, and quickly compelled 
compliance with their demand. The entire Danish fleet, and all 
the naval stores which could be found, were carried off by the 
English as war booty. The proceeding was admittedly a high- 
handed one, and probably England lost more by it than she 
gained; for it aroused against her a feeling of bitter indignation 
on the Continent, and caused Denmark, hitherto neutral, to enter 
into a close alliance with Napoleon. 

629. Napoleon takes possession of Portugal (November, 1807). 
— The English had foiled Napoleon in his designs upon the Danish 
fleet. They also marred his plans concerning Portugal. Shortly 
after the Danish affair, he sent an army under the command of 
Junot into the peninsula. Upon the approach of the French 
army to Lisbon the royal family, acting upon the advice of the 
English government, embarked on board the Portuguese fleet 
and, escorted by several English war ships, sailed for Brazil. 

Thus the fleet was got out of Napoleon's reach, but the country 
passed into the hands of the French. A proclamation by Junot 
declared that " the House of Braganza had ceased to rule," and 
Portugal now became virtually a province of Napoleon's empire. 

630. Napoleon places his Brother Joseph upon the Spanish 
Throne (June 6, 1808); the Spanish Uprising. — The seizure of 
Portugal was only the first step in the carrying out by Napoleon 
of his scheme for making himself master of the whole of the 
Iberian peninsula. Spain was next appropriated. 

Arrogantly interfering in the affairs of that country, — the 
government it must be said was desperately incompetent and 



564 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

corrupt, and the condition of things in the royal family most 
disgraceful, — Napoleon induced the weak-minded Bourbon king, 
Charles IV, to resign to him as " his dearly beloved friend and 
ally" his crown, which he at once bestowed upon his brother 
Joseph (June 6, 1808). The throne of Naples, which Joseph 
had been occupying,^^ was transferred to Murat, Napoleon's 
brother-in-law. Thus did this audacious man make and unmake 
kings, and give away thrones and kingdoms. 

But the high-spirited Spaniards were not the people to submit 
tamely to such an indignity as Napoleon had inflicted upon them. 
The entire nation from the Pyrenees to the Straits of Gibraltar 
flew to arms. The uprising had world-wide significance. "The 
effect produced by Spanish enthusiasm in all its reckless wildness 
was incalculable, and makes this rebellion stand out as the greatest 
European event which had happened since the French Revolu- 
tion, and the beginning of a new and grand chapter in European 
history." ^o 

Portugal also rose, and England sent to her aid a force under 
Sir Arthur Wellesley, afterwards Duke of Wellington, and the hero 
of Waterloo. In Spain as in Portugal humiliating disasters, like 
an avenging Nemesis, overtook the French. In Southern Spain 
an army of over twenty thousand was forced to surrender to the 
Spaniards.^ This made necessary the abandonment of Madrid 
by the French. Joseph fled in dismay from his throne before he 
had been seated upon it more than eight days. The French 
retreated beyond the Ebro, almost to the foot of the Pyrenees. 
In Portugal fate was equally adverse to them. After a serious 
defeat at the hands of the English, Junot signed an agreement 
according to the terms of which the French were to evacuate 
Portugal, the English agreeing to carry them home by sea. 

Napoleon, aside from his unfortunate expedition to Egypt, had 
never before met with such a check. The warning words of his 
brother Joseph, who had written him, " Your glory will suffer 

19 Napoleon had dethroned the Bourbons in Naples in 1806. 

20 Seeley, Life and Times of Stein, vol. i, p. 346. 

21 This was the memorable capitulation of Baylen (July 20, 1808). 



THE CONGRESS AT ERFURT 565 

shipwreck in Spain," seemed to have found quick fulfillment. 
Napoleon realized that he must take the field himself if the 
prestige of the French arms was to be restored. 

631. The Congress at Erfurt (September-October, 1808). — 
Before setting out on this enterprise, however. Napoleon deemed 
it politic to have an interview with the Tsar Alexander, in order 
to renew the friendship and cement afresh the alliance entered 
into between them at Tilsit, — for he was well aware that the Tsar 
was chafing under the workings of the Continental Blockade. 

The meeting took place at Erfurt. This celebrated Congress 
marks the culminating point of Napoleon's extraordinary career. 
Europe probably had never seen anything in imperial magnifi- 
cence, in civil and mihtary display, to equal this gathering. 
Napoleon on this occasion played host to four vassal kings, to 
scores of princes and ambassadors, and to the greatest poets and 
men of letters of the time. French actors, brought from Paris, 
presented night after night to " a parterre of kings " the master- 
pieces of the French stage. 

The obsequiousness of all, in particular of the petty German 
princes, to Napoleon is what most amazes us. The meeting 
between Napoleon and Goethe and Wieland possesses a painful 
interest. Both of the great poets seemed dazzled by the genius 
of the conqueror of Europe, and bowed in homage at his feet. 
Goethe was flattered when Napoleon greeted him with the words, 
" You are a man " ; and both accepted at his hands the cross of 
the Legion of Honor. ^^ 

Amidst festivals, parades, balls, and operas the main purpose 
of the meeting was not forgotten by Napoleon. The Tilsit alli- 
ance between him and the Russian Emperor was renewed. In 
return for being allowed to absorb Finland — Alexander had at 
this time nearly completed the conquest of that province — and 
to appropriate the Danubian provinces of the Sultan, the Tsar 



22 Of course, in judging the conduct of the German princes and German men of 
letters at this Erfurt meeting, we should bear in mind how weak at this time the 
sentiment of nationality among the Germans really was. For the attitude of Goethe 
and other German thinkers towards nationalism, see sec. 640, n. 26. 



566 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

was to keep Austria quiet while Napoleon was busy in Spain, and 
was to rigorously enforce the blockade against England. 

632. Napoleon in Spain (November, 1808-January, 1809). — 
From the Congress at Erfurt Napoleon hastened into Spain. At 
the head of an army of over a hundred thousand men he marched 
southward, entered Madrid in triumph, reseated his brother upon 
the Spanish throne, and then told the Spaniards that if they did 
not respect Joseph he would put the crown on his own head and 
teach them what was becoming conduct in subjects. 

Napoleon now began the pursuit of a British army which under 
Sir John Moore had marched from Portugal into Spain. Threat- 
ening tidings from another quarter of Europe caused him to give 
over the pursuit into the hands of one of his marshals,^ while he 
himself hastened back to Paris. 

633. Napoleon's Third Campaign against Austria (1809). — 
Taking advantage of Napoleon's troubles in the Iberian penin- 
sula, Emperor Francis I of Austria had put his army on a war 
footing, and was making ready to throw down the gage of battle. 

Napoleon, since his best troops were occupied in Spain, sin- 
cerely desired peace with Austria. But the Emperor Francis was 
bent on war, his hopes of regaining what had been lost appar- 
ently rendering him forgetful of Austerlitz. " The waters of Lethe 
and not the waters of the Danube," said Napoleon to a group of 
foreign ambassadors, " seem to wash the walls of Vienna." 
, The war opened in the spring of 1809. At the end of a short 
campaign, the most noted engagements of which were the hard- 
fought battles of Aspem (Essling) and Wagram, Austria was again 
at Napoleon's feet. 

The Emperor Francis was now forced to cede large tracts of 
his dominions to Bavaria and to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, 
and to surrender to Napoleon Carniola, Istria, and other lands. 
These last, together with certain cessions made by Austria in 

23 The retreat of Sir John Moore from the heart of Spain before a greatly superior 
French force is given a place along with that of the Ten Thousand Greeks among the 
memorable retreats in history. Moore was killed in the battle of Corunna (Jan. i6, 
1809), on the northern coast of Spain, and the remnant of his army, which his skill 
and gallantry had saved, were taken on board the Enghsh fleet. 



NAPOLEON AND THE PAPAL STATES 567 

1805, Napoleon added to his empire under the name of the 
lUyrian Provinces. 

The cession by Austria of her Illyrian lands deprived her of 
her water front on the Adriatic Sea and shut her out from the 
Mediterranean. At the same time these lands were a valuable 
acquisition for Napoleon. He now had actual or virtual control 
of the whole of the European coast line from the frontier of 
Turkey on the Adriatic to the frontier of Russia on the Baltic. 

634. Union of the Papal States with Napoleon*s Empire (May, 
1809). — Napoleon's Continental System had led him into deep 
trouble in the Iberian peninsula. It now contributed to bring 
him into trouble with the Papacy. Pope Pius VII refused to 
enforce the blockade against England and further presumed to 
disregard other commands of Napoleon. Thereupon Napoleon 
declared that the Pope "was no longer a secular prince," and 
took possession of his domains. Pope Pius straightway excom- 
municated the Emperor, who thereupon arrested him, and for 
three years held him a state prisoner. He further removed the 
College of Cardinals to Paris. Thither he also transferred all the 
chief officers of the papal government, together with the papal 
archives. Hundreds of wagonloads of books and documents were 
dragged to the French capital. 

Napoleon's idea in all this was to get the entire machinery of 
the papal government under his hand. He had in mind to pre- 
side over the councils of the Church as Constantine and Charle- 
magne had done. After his fall he commented as follows upon 
this part of his plan for setting up a imiversal autocracy : " Paris 
would have become the capital of Christendom, and I should 
have governed the religious as well as the political world." 

635. Napoleon's Second Marriage (1810). — Soon after his 
triumph over the Emperor Francis, Napoleon divorced his wife 
Josephine in order to form a new alliance with the Archduchess 
Marie Louise of Austria.^* Josephine bowed meekly to the will of 

24 Josephine was divorced Dec. 15, 1809; the marriage to Marie. Louise took place 
April 2, 18 TO. Josephine retained her title of Empress, and was assigned the palace 
of Malmaison as a residence with a pension of two million francs a year. To the very 
last she and Napoleon were -good friends. Her death occurred May 29, 1814. 



568 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

her lord and went into sorrowful exile from his palace. Napoleon's 
object in this matter was to cover the reproach of his plebeian 
birth by an alliance with one of the ancient royal families of 
Europe, and to secure the perpetuity of his government by leaving 
an heir to be the inheritor of his throne and fortunes. 

The desire and ambition of Napoleon to found a dynasty 
seemed realized when, the year following his marriage with the 
archduchess, a son was born to them, who was given the title of 
King of Rome. His enemies could now no longer, as he reproached 
them with doing, make appointments at his grave. He had now 
something more than " sl life interest " in France. The succession 
was assured. 

In forming this family alliance with Napoleon, the conqueror 
and oppressor of Germany, the Emperor Francis undermined his 
position as German leader in the coming War of Liberation and 
left the way clear for Prussia to assume that place of venture and 
of honor. 

636. Holland and North German Coast Lands annexed to Napo- 
leon's Empire (18 10). — During this year of his second marriage 
Napoleon made two fresh territorial additions to his empire. 

Louis Bonaparte, — king of Holland, it will be recalled, — dis- 
approving of his brother's Continental System, which was ruining 
the trade of the Dutch, abdicated the crown. Thereupon Napo- 
leon incorporated Holland with the French Empire (July 9, 1810). 

A few months later Napoleon also annexed to his empire all 
the German coast land from Holland to Liibeck in order to be 
able to close the important ports here, including the old Hanseatic 
cities of Bremen, Hamburg, and Liibeck, against English trade. 

637. Napoleon's Empire at its Greatest Extent (181 1). — In 
these additions the Napoleonic empire received its last enlarge- 
ment. Napoleon was now, in outward seeming, ^^ at the height of 
his marvelous fortunes. Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, Friedland, and 
Wagram were the successive steps by which he had mounted to 
the most dizzy heights of military power and glory. 

25 It is probably true that the height of Napoleon's real power is marked by the 
Treaty of Tilsit (1807). 



WEAKNESS OF THE EMPIRE 569 

The empire which this soldier of fortune had built up stretched 
from Liibeck to beyond Rome, embracing France proper, the 
Netherlands, part of Western and Northwestern Germany, all 
Western Italy as far south as the kingdom of Naples, together with 
the lUyrian Provinces and the Ionian Islands. 

On all sides were aUied, vassal, or dependent states. Several 
of the ancient thrones of Europe were occupied by Napoleon's 
relatives or his favorite marshals. He himself was king of the 
kingdom of Italy, Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, 
and Mediator of Switzerland. Austria and Prussia were com- 
pletely subject to his will. Russia and Denmark were his allies. 

Such were the relations of the once great powers and independ- 
ent states of Europe to "the Corsican adventurer." Not since 
the time of the Caesars had one man's will swayed so much of 
the civilized world. 

638. Elements of Weakness in the Empire. — But, splendid and 
imposing as at this moment appeared the external affairs of 
Napoleon, the sun of his fortunes, which had risen so brightly at 
AusterUtz, had already passed its meridian. There were many 
things just now contributing to the weakness of Napoleon's empire 
and foreboding its speedy dissolution. Founded and upheld by 
the genius of this single man, it depended solely upon his life and 
fortunes. The diverse elements it embraced were as yet so loosely 
joined that there could be no good hope that it would survive 
either the misfortune or the death of its founder. 

Again, Napoleon's Continental System, through the suffering 
and loss it inflicted particularly upon the maritime countries of 
Europe, had caused murmurs of discontent all around the cir- 
cumference of the Continent. 

Still again, the conscriptions of the Emperor had drained 
France of men, and her armies were now recruited by mere boys, 
who were utterly unfit to bear the burden and fatigue of Napo- 
leon's rapid campaigns. The heavy taxes, also, which were nec- 
essary to meet the expenses of Napoleon's wars, and to carry on 
the splendid pubHc works upon which he was constantly engaged, 
produced great suffering and discontent throughout the empire. 



570 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

Furthermore, Napoleon's harsh and unjust treatment of Pope 
Pius VII had ahenated the Catholic clergy and created a resentful 
feeling among pious Catholics everywhere. 

At the same time the crowd of deposed princes and dispossessed 
aristocrats in those states which Napoleon had reconstructed, and 
in which he had set up the new code of equal rights, were natu- 
rally resentful, and were ever watching an opportunity to regain 
their lost power and privileges. 

Even the large class who at first welcomed Napoleon as the 
representative of the French ideas of equality and liberty, and 
applauded while he overturned ancient thrones and stripped of 
their privileges ancient aristocracies, — even many of these early 
adherents had been turned into bitter enemies by his adoption of 
imperial manners and the formation of a court, by his violation 
of the principle of equality through the creation of an hereditary 
aristocracy, and especially by his setting aside his first wife, 
Josephine, and forming a marriage alliance with one of the old 
hated royal houses of Europe. 

639. The New Force destined to destroy Napoleon's Empire : the 
Nations. — But the active force which was to overwhelm Napoleon's 
empire and to free Europe from his tyranny was the sentiment 
of national patriotism which was being aroused iii the dismem- 
bered and vassal states, and in those threatened with the loss of 
independence. Up to the time of his invasion of Spain, Napoleon 
had warred against the governments of Europe. Those govern- 
ments he had been able to overturn easily because they were not 
based on the love and loyalty of their subjects. 

But now Napoleon, in his ambition to make himself master of 
all Europe, was contemptuously disregarding the claims of race 
and nationality. The Empire threatened to become the tomb of 
the Nations. In the face of this danger national patriotism was 
being everywhere awakened. 

After the surrender of Ulm, when Austria was for the second 
time beaten to the ground by Napoleon, the English minister 
Pitt said to some desponding friends, who expressed the opinion 
that the French Emperor could never be resisted on land, that 



THE REGENERATION OF PRUSSIA 571 

" Napoleon would meet with a check when he encountered a 
national resistance ; and that Spain was the place for it ; and 
that then England would intervene." Commenting upon this 
prophecy, Lord Acton pronounces it " the most astounding and 
profound prediction in all political history, where such things 
have not been rare." 

We have witnessed the popular uprising in Spain ; we shall now 
witness a similar movement in North Germany and in Russia. 

640. The Regeneration of Prussia ; Stein, Hardenberg, and 
Scharnhorst. — It was in Prussia that this movement for a national 
life had its greatest response. After the crushing defeat at Jena 
Prussia passed completely under the power of Napoleon. The 
very fact that through such a military defeat they had become the 
subjects of their former enemy did more than any other single 
event to call into life the long-dormant sentiment of national 
patriotism among the Germans. The growth of this new feeling 
was stimulated and directed by various agencies. 

Foremost among these agencies were the stirring patriotic songs 
of the poets Arndt, Korner, and others, which kindled in thou- 
sands a hitherto unwonted fervor of enthusiasm for their country. 
Schiller, also, in his plays, especially William Tell and The Maid 
of Orleans, aroused a new martial spirit and a new sense of 
national honor. 

Education became another of the means of national quickening 
and regeneration. In the year 1808, while Napoleon's garrisons 
held all the chief fortresses of Prussia and his spies and informers 
made dangerous any utterance adverse to his rule, the philosopher 
Fichte delivered before Berlin audiences a remarkable course of 
lectures entitled "Addresses to the German Nation." No such 
appeal had been made to the German rhind and heart since Luther 
published his "Address to the German Nobility" (sec. 324). 

Fichte's idea was that public education was the only hopeful 
agency for the moral and political regeneration of the German 
nation. The German youth must be taught the duty of unselfish 
devotion to the public welfare, and must be made to realize the joy 
of making sacrifices for his country. Thus was a wholly new 



572 



THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 



spirit breathed into German education and German philosophy.^^ 
Thousands of German youths were stirred by a sentiment they had 
never felt before, — an ardent love for their country and its name. 
At the same time that the poets, phibsophers, and teachers 
were creating by their appeals and methods a new spirit in 
Prussian society, the masses of the people were being reached 
and awakened by the social and economic reforms carried out 
by the two eminent statesmen, Stein and Hardenberg.'^' 

Two thirds of the population of 
Prussia were at this time serfs. Now, 
Stein's controlling idea was that the 
strength of a state depends upon the 
patriotism of the people ; but his in- 
sight revealed to him the truth that 
" patriots cannot be made out of 
serfs." Hence his policy of enfran- 
chisement. 

By a celebrated Edict of Emanci- 
pation serfdom was abolished. The 
peasant was no longer the hereditary 
subject of a landlord, but could work 
Fig. 95. — Barox vom Stein for any employer and could even hope 




(From an 
Roffe) 



engraving by W. 



to acquire a piece of land as his own. 

Thus the economic development of 
Prussia became possible. The Prussian king, in the words of 
Stein, was no longer " the king of slaves, but of free men." This 

26 Hitherto the greatest thinkers and writers of Germany had insisted that the 
individual seek culture simply for his own sake. The state was the thing of last con- 
cern with the great poet Goethe. National patriotism he regarded as a narrow senti- 
ment unworthy of a great mind. The poet Lessing declared patriotism to be "a 
heroic weakness," and love of fatherland a sentiment which he had never felt. Equally 
free from this " heroic weakness,'' as related to a German fatherland, was the philoso- 
pher Hegel. The idea with all these great poets and philosophers was that Cosmo- 
politanism is a nobler thing than Nationalism, — that men should regard themselves^ 
not as citizens of a paltry state but as citizens of the world. 

aJ" Baron vom Stein was made chief minister by King Frederick William, Oct. 4, 
1807, and given a free hand in carrying out proposed reforms. At the end of thirteen 
months Napoleon, who recognized the tendency and aim of Stein's measures, forced 
the king to dismiss him from office. Prince von Hardenberg succeeded him and 
carried on more cautiously the work he had begun. 



THE REGENERATION OF PRUSSIA 573 

change had a great effect on Prussia's future. Henceforth she 
was not merely a state but a nation. 

Along with serfdom, class privileges and distinctions, which 
had divided the population of Prussia into classes separated by 
almost impassable lines, were now swept away. The towns were 
given a measure of local self-government, which was to prepare 
the way for the representatives of the people to participate in the 
national government. 

While Stein and Hardenberg were effecting these reforms in 
the civil realm, Scharnhorst, the Minister of War, was reorganizing 
the army on the model of that of France. The old army, which 
had gone to pieces so disgracefully on the field of Jena, was made 
up of conscripted peasants, officered by incompetent and insolent 
nobles. Flogging was the punishment for even the most trivial 
offenses. The new army was an army of self-respecting citizens, 
a truly national army, based on the principle of compulsory 
universal military service in which both officers and men received 
special training for their duties. 

Thus equality in all relations, civil and military, replaced gall- 
ing and, degrading inequality. The effect of these reforms upon 
the spirit of the people was magical. They effected the political 
regeneration of Prussia. In other words, Stein and Hardenberg 
and Scharnhorst did for Prussia, in the name of the king, what 
the Constituent Assembly and the Convention, in the name of the 
people, had done for France. Prussia now became a strong nation, 
because Prussia was no longer simply the king and the aristocracy, 
but also the Prussian people. 

The new Prussia became the leader of the German nation in 
the memorable War of Liberation, which we are now approaching. 
This uprising of the Prussian nation against Napoleon forms one 
of the most dramatic and remarkable passages in the history of 
the German people. 

641. Napoleon's Invasion of Russia (1812-1813). — The signal 
for the general uprising of Germany and the rest of Europe was 
the terrible misfortune which befell Napoleon in his invasion 
of Russia. Various circumstances had concurred to weaken the 



574 



THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 



friendship and break the alliance between the Russian Emperor 
and Napoleon ; but the main cause of mutual distrust and aliena- 
tion was the Continental Blockade. This had inflicted great loss 
upon Russian trade, and the Tsar had finally refused to carry out 
Napoleon's decrees, and entered a coalition against France. 

Napoleon resolved to force Russia, as he had the rest of con- 
tinental Europe, to bow to his will. Gathering contingents from 
all his vassal states, he crossed the Russian frontier at the head 
of what was proudly called the Grand Army, numbering upwards 
of four hundred thousand men. After making a single stand at 
Smolensk, the Russian army avoided battle, and as it retreated 
into the interior devastated the country in front of the advancing 
enemy. Finally, at Borodino, seventy miles from Moscow, the 




Fig. 96. — The Kremlin of Moscow. (From a photograph) 



Russians halted and offered battle to cover the city, but in a ter- 
ribly bloody struggle, in which the aggregate loss in killed and 
wounded of the two armies was upwards of seventy thousand 
men, their resistance was broken and the invaders entered the 
ancient capital in triumph. 

To his astonishment Napoleon found the city practically de- 
serted by its inhabitants; and two days after he had estab- 
lished himself in the empty palace of the Tsar (in the Kremlin), 
fires, started in some unknown way, broke out simultaneously in 
different quarters of the city. The conflagration raged for five 
days, until the greater part of the city was reduced to ashes. 

Napoleon's situation was now critical. He had confidently 
expected, from his knowledge of the Emperor Alexander, that 



NAPOLEON'S INVASION OF RUSSIA 575 

as soon as the French army was in Moscow he would sue for 
peace. But to Napoleon's messages Alexander returned for reply 
that he would not enter into negotiations with him so long as a 
single French soldier stood upon Russian soil. 
• In the hope that the Tsar would abandon his heroic resolve, 
Napoleon lingered about the ruined city until the middle of 
October, and then finally gave orders lor the return march. This 
delay was a fatal mistake, and resulted in one of the greatest 
tragedies in history. Before the retreating French columns had 
covered half the distance to the frontier, the terrible Russian 
winter was upon them. The sufferings of the ill-clad soldiers were 
intense. Thousands were frozen to death. The spot of each 
bivouac was marked by the circle of dead around the watch fires. 
Sometimes in a single night as many as two or three hundred 
perished. Thousands more were slain by the peasants and the 
wild Cossacks, who hovered about the retreating columns and 
harassed them day and night. The passage of the river Beresina 
was attended with appalling losses. 

Soon after the passage of this stream Napoleon, conscious that 
the fate of his empire depended upon his presence in Paris, left 
the remnant of the army in charge of his marshals and hurried 
by post to his capital. 

The loss by death of the French and their allies in this disas- 
trous campaign is reckoned at upwards of two hundred and fifty 
thousand men, while that of the Russians is estimated to have 
been almost as large. 

642. The War of Liberation ; the Battle of Leipzig, the " Battle 
of the Nations" (Oct. 16-19, 1^13)- — Napoleon's fortunes were 
buried with his Grand Army in the snows of Russia. His woeful 
losses here, taken in connection with his great losses in Spain, 
encouraged the European powers to think that now they could 
crush him. A sixth coalition was formed, embracing Russia, 
Prussia, England, Sweden, and later Austria. 

Napoleon made gigantic efforts to prepare for the final 
struggle. By the spring of 18 13 he was at the head of a new 
army, numbering eventually over three hundred thousand men, 



5/6 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

— boys we should say, so extremely young were a large number 
of the fresh recruits. Falling upon the allied armies of the Russians 
and Prussians, first at Liitzen and then at Bautzen, Napoleon 
gained a decisive victory upon both fields. Austria now appeared 
in the lists, and at Leipzig, in Saxony, Napoleon was attacked by 
the leagued armies of Europe. So many were the powers repre- 
sented upon this renowned field that it is known in history as the 
" Battle of the Nations." The combat lasted three days. Napo- 
leon was defeated and forced to retreat into France. 

Some attempts at negotiations which were now made proved 
futile, since Napoleon, desperate as was his situation, would not 
accept the reasonable terms offered him by the allies, which 
were in substance that France should be content with her natural 
boundaries, — the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees. 

The armies of the allies now poured over all the French fron- 
tiers. Napoleon's tremendous efforts to roll back the tide of inva- 
sion were all in vain. Paris surrendered to the alHes (March 31, 
1 8 14). As the struggle became manifestly hopeless, his most 
trusted officers deserted and betrayed him. The French Senate, 
acting under the inspiration of the celebrated Talleyrand, who 
had earlier served Napoleon as his Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
issued a decree deposing the Emperor and restoring the throne 
to the Bourbons. Napoleon was forced to abdicate and was ban- 
ished to . the little island of Elba in the Mediterranean, being 
permitted to retain his title of Emperor and to keep about him 
a few of his old guards. But Elba was a very diminutive empire 
for one to whom the half of Europe had seemed too small, and 
we shall not be surprised to learn that Napoleon was not content 
with it. 

643. " The Hundred Days ' ' (March 20-June 29,1815). — Upon 
invitation of the French Senate the brother of Louis XVI now 
assumed the crown with the title of Louis XVIII. With this new 
Bourbon king the allies arranged a treaty,^^ the shifty Talleyrand 
acting as Louis' representative. This treaty gave France the fron- 
tiers she had in 1792. 

28 First Treaty of Paris, May 30, 1814. 



"THE HUNDRED DAYS" 577 

In accordance with a promise he had made, Louis gave France 
a constitution. Notwithstanding, he acted very much as though 
his power were unlimited. He styled himself " King of France 
and Navarre by the grace of God ^ He always alluded to the year 
in which he began to rule as the nineteenth year of his reign, thus 
affecting to ignore wholly the government of the Republic and the 
Empire. This excited alarm, because it seemed to question the 
validity of all that had been done since the dethronement and 
execution of Louis XVI. 

The result of this reactionary policy was widespread dissatis- 
faction. Some, fearing lest all the work of the Revolution would 
be undone, began to desire the return of Napoleon, and the wish 
was perhaps what gave rise to the report which was spread about 
that he would come back with the spring violets. 

In the month of March, 1815, as the commissioners of the 
various powers were sitting at Vienna rearranging the landmarks 
and boundaries obhterated by the French inundation, news was 
brought to them that Napoleon had escaped from Elba and was 
in France. At first the members of the Congress were incredu- 
lous, regarding the thing as a jest, and were with difficulty con- 
vinced of the truth of the report. 

Taking advantage of the general dissatisfaction with the rule 
of the restored Bourbons, Napoleon had resolved upon a bold 
push for the recovery of his crown. Landing with about eight 
hundred guardsmen at one of the southern ports of France, he 
aroused all the country with one of his stirring addresses, and 
then immediately pushed on towards Paris. His journey to the 
capital was one continuous ovation. One regiment after another, 
forgetting their recent oath of loyalty to the Bourbons, hastened 
to join his train. His old generals and soldiers embraced him 
with transports of joy.^® Marshal Ney, sent to arrest the Emperor, 
whom he had promised to bring to Paris in a cage, at the first 
sight of his old commander threw himself into his arms and 
pledged him his sword and his life. Louis XVIII, deserted by 

29 Napoleon's return was welcomed by the army, especially by the returned prisoners 
from Russia and Germany, but it was not welcomed by the French people generally. 



5/3 THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE 

his army, was left helpless, and, as Napoleon approached the gates 
of Paris, fled from his throne. 

Napoleon desired peace with the sovereigns of Europe ; but 
they did not think the peace of the continent could be main- 
tained so long as he sat upon the French throne. For the seventh 
and last time the allies leagued their armies against "the dis- 
turber of the peace of Europe." 

Hoping to overwhelm the armies of the allies by striking them 
one after another before they had time to unite, Napoleon moved 
swiftly into Belgium with an army of one hundred and thirty 
thousand in order to crush there the English under the Duke 
of Wellington and the Prussians under Bllicher. He first fell in 
with and defeated the Prussian army, and then faced the English 
at Waterloo (June i8, 1815). 

The story of Waterloo need not be told, — how all day the 
French broke their columns in vain on the English squares; 
how, at the critical moment towards the close of the day when 
Wellington was wishing for Bliicher ■ or for night, Bliicher with 
a fresh force of thirty thousand Prussians turned the tide of 
battle ; and how the famous Old Guard, which knew how to die 
but not how to surrender,^" made its last charge and left its 
hitherto invincible squares upon the lost field. 

A second time Napoleon was forced to abdicate,^^ and a second 
time Louis XVIH ascended his unstable throne.^^ Napoleon 
made his way to the coast, purposing to take ship for the United 
States; but the way was barred by British watchfulness, and he 
was constrained to surrender to the commander of the English 
war ship Belle7'ophon. " I come, like Themistocles," he said, " to 
throw myself upon the hospitality of the English people." 

But no one believed that Napoleon could safely be left at large, 
or that his presence, even though he were in close confinement, 

30 General Cambronne, the commander of the Guard, when summoned to surrender, 
is said to have returned this reply : " The Guard dies, but never surrenders." There 
is doubt concerning the origin of the famous phrase. 

31 His abdication was in favor of his little son, whom he proclaimed " Napoleon II, 
Emperor of the French." 

32 The allies now signed with Louis what is known as the Second Treaty of Paris 
(Nov. 20, 1815). France had now to accept the frontiers which were hers in 178Q. 



i 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 579 

anywhere in Europe would be consistent with the future security 
and repose of the continent. Some even urged that he be given 
up to Louis XVIII to be shot as a rebel and an outlaw. The final 
decision was that he should be banished to the island of St. Helena, 
in the South Atlantic. Thither he was carried by the English, and 
closely guarded by them until his death in 182 1. 

The story of these last years of Napoleon Bonaparte, as gath- 
ered from the companions of his exile, is one of the most 
pathetic in all history. At the time of his death he was in his 
fifty-second year. As a military genius and commander he left 
a deeper impress upon the imagination of the world, and fills a 
larger place in history, probably, than any other man who ever lived. 

Selections from the Sources. — Bourrienne, Memoirs of Napoleon 
Bonaparte. Bourrienne was Bonaparte's schoolfellow and comrade, and 
then his private secretary from 1796 to 1802. Tarbell, The Words of 
Napoleon, contains interesting selections from Napoleon's addresses and 
letters. In reading these extracts it should be borne in mind that Napo- 
leon's speeches, like his- bulletins, often bore no relation to the actual 
facts or to his own real thoughts and purposes. 

Secondary Works. — Among the numerous biographies of Napoleon 
the following possess special merit and authority : Fournier, Napoleon 
the First ; Johnston, Napoleon; Rose, The Life of Napoleon I ; Sloane, 
Life of Napoleon Bonaparte ; Lanfrey, The History of Napoleon the First 
(left incomplete by the death of the author) ; Seeley, Napoleon the First ; 
and Ropes, The First Napoleon. Lanfrey makes the Emperor the subject 
of bitter reproach. One of the best extended histories of the Napoleonic 
period is Thiers, History of the Consulate and the Empire. Excellent 
short accounts are Stephens, Revolutionary Europe, lySg-iSi^, chaps, 
vii-xi; Rose, The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era, last part, chap, vii; 
and Andrews, The Histoj-ical Development of Europe, vol. i, chap. ii. 

Works dealing with special phases of the history of the period : Mahan, 
The Influence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire, 
vol. ii; Seeley, Life aitd Times of Stein ; and Bigelow, History of the 
German Struggle for Liberty. See al&o Lord Rosebery, Napoleon: the 
Last Phase ; on the Emperor's imprisonment at St. Helena. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Bonaparte at school. 2. The sale of 
Louisiana to the United States. 3. The Civil Code. 4. Execution of the 
Duke of Enghien. 5. The Congress at Erfurt. 6. Baron vom Stein and 
his reforms. 7. Napoleon at St. Helena. 



Ill THE RESTORATION OF 1815 AND THE DEMO- 
CRATIC REACTION: THE SEQUEL TO 
THE REVOLUTION 
(18 15-1904) 



CHAPTER XXXV 
THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND METTERNICH 

644. Ideas bequeathed by the French Revolution to the Nine- 
teenth Century. — The social and political history of Europe 
since the overthrow of Napoleon is a continuation of the history 
of the great social and political upheaval which we have been 
witnessing. The dominant forces at work throughout this period 
have been the ideas or principles inherited from the French 
Revolution. 

There were three of these ideas, with which, as revolution- 
ary forces in history, we have already become familiar in tracing 
the story of the Revolution and the Empire. The first was the 
idea or principle of equality. The Revolutionists proclaimed this 
doctrine with religious fervor. It was spread broadcast over 
Europe. The French army, as it has been tersely expressed, was 
" equality on the march." The Code Napoleon, as we have seen, 
embodied this principle of equality, and wherever it was set up, — 
in the Netherlands, in the West German states, in part of Poland, 
in Switzerland, and in Italy, — it exerted the same leveling influence 
that it had in France. As Christianity brought in equality before 
God, so did the Revolution bring in equality before Caesar. The 
one made all men equal in the religious realm, the other made all 
men equal in the civil realm. 

580 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA 581 

The second principle promulgated by the Revolution was that 
of popular sovereignty. According to this doctrine, governments 
derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. The 
laws should be the expression of the will of all. The people 
either directly or through their representatives should have part 
in the government. All rulers and magistrates are the servants of 
the people and are responsible to them. 

The third principle that underlay the Revolution was that of 
nationality. This principle requires that the state shall coincide 
with the nation. It demands that every nation shall be free to 
choose its own form of government and to manage its own affairs 
in its own way. This idea worked itself out during the course 
of the Revolution. It was evoked, as we have learned, in great 
measure by Napoleon's cynical disregard of national sentiment 
and his wanton violation of national rights. 

These principles or ideas, as we have said, were the precious 
political heritage which the nineteenth century received from the 
Revolution.^ They were full of vitality and energy. Their out- 
working, their embodiment in social institutions, in law, in gov- 
ernment, makes up a large part of the history of the more 
advanced nations of the world since the downfall of Napoleon. 

But these ideas, as we have intimated, have not had free course. 
Their embodiment in social institutions and in political forms has, 
in most of the European countries, been a process violent and 
revolutionary in character. This has resulted from these liberal 
principles coming into conflict with certain opposing conserva- 
tive doctrines with which they have had to struggle for supremacy. 
And this brings us to the starting point of the history of the 
nineteenth century, — the celebrated Congress of Vieima. 

645. The Congress of Vienna (September, 181 4-June, 1 8 1 5 ) . — 
After the first abdication of Napoleon, as we have seen, the 
European sovereigns, either in person or by their representatives. 



1 Of course these ideas were not novel doctrines promulgated now for tlie first 
time. All that is meant by calling them the ideas of the French Revolution is that 
by the Revolution they were invested with new authority and were given a new course 
in the world. 



582 CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND METTERNICH 

met at Vienna to readjust the affairs of the Continent. As we 
shall hereafter, in connection with the history of the separate 
European countries, have occasion to say something respecting 
the relations of each to the Congress, we shall here say only a 
word regarding the spirit and temper of the assembly and the 
general character of its work. 

The Vienna commissioners seemed to have but one thought 
and aim, — to restore everything as nearly as possible to its con- 
dition before the Revolution. They had no care for the people ; 
the princes were their only concern. The principle of nationality 
was wholly ignored, while that of the sovereignty of the people 
was, by most of the plenipotentiaries, looked upon as a principle 
of disorder to be repressed in every possible way. 

The first principle adopted by the Congress was that of legiti- 
macy. According to this principle a throne is to be regarded like 
any ordinary piece of property. Long possession gives a good and 
indefeasible title. 

Under this rule all the new usurping famihes set up by Na- 
poleon were swept aside without ceremony, and the old exiled 
dynasties were restored. The most important of these restitutions, 
effected either by the direct action of the Congress or already 
consummated by events and confirmed by it, were those which 
brought back the banished Bourbon dynasties in France, Spain, 
and Naples.^ 

The question of legitimacy having been settled, the next ques- 
tion was how the territories recovered from Napoleon should be 
distributed among the dynasties recognized as legitimate. For 
most of the sovereigns this was the subject of chief interest. 
Russia wanted the whole of Poland ; Prussia wanted the kingdom of 
Saxony ; Sweden wanted Norway ; Austria wanted territory in Italy. 

In making the distribution the Vienna map makers took no 
thought whatever of the rights and claims of race or nationality. 



2 The principle was applied only in the case of hereditary lay rulers. And even 
here an exception was made in the case of the hundreds of petty German rulers whose 
territories Napoleon in his reorganization of Germany had given to the larger states. 
These princelets were not restored. 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA 583 

The inhabitants of the countries available for division were ap- 
portioned among the different sovereigns exactly as a herd of 
cattle might be divided up and apportioned among different 
owners. The following territorial settlements were among the 
most important. 

The Belgian and Dutch provinces were united into a single 
state, which under the name of the Kingdom of the Netherlands 
was given to a prince of the House of Orange. The idea here 
was to create on this side of France as strong a barrier as pos- 
sible against French aggression in the future. The fact that the 
Dutch and the Belgians, by reason of differences in race, in reli- 
gion, and in industrial development, formed really two distinct 
nations was wholly ignored. 

Sweden was confirmed in the possession of Norway,^ which 
Denmark lost as a consequence of her alliance with Napoleon. 

Russia was allowed to retain Finland and Bessarabia, and was 
given the greater part of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. The Polish 
lands acquired by Russia were made into what was called the King- 
dom of Poland, with the Tsar as its king. The Poles were informed 
that they ihust give up all thought and hope of the restoration of 
their national independence. 

Prussia was given about half of the kingdom of Saxony, exten- 
sive territories on both sides of the Rhine, and other lands, which 
gave her a more preponderant position in Germany than she had 
before the Revolution. 

Austria, in compensation for the loss of her Netherland prov- 
inces, was given, besides a long strip of the eastern shore lands 
of the Adriatic Sea, Lombardy and Venetia in Upper Italy. This 
extension of Austrian rule over Italian lands was one of the gross- 
est violations of the principles of nationality of which the Congress 
was guilty, and was to be signally avenged when the hour for 
Italian unity and independence arrived. 

3 In the midst of the War of Liberation, Bernadotte, king of Sweden, had forced 
from the Danish king (Treaty of Kiel, Jan. 14, 18 14) the cession of Norway. The 
arrangement in the Scandinavian peninsula confirmed by the Congress subsisted 
until 1905, when Norway declared the union dissolved, and, choosing Prince Charles 
of Denmark as king, became an independent kingdom. 



584 CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND METTERNICH 

In Germany the Congress built upon the basis laid by Napo- 
leon. Thirty-nine of the forty-two sovereign states, including 
Prussia and Austria, to which he had reduced the hundreds of 
states constituting the old Germanic system, were organized into 
a confederation modeled upon the Confederation of the Rhine.* 

In Italy, on the other hand. Napoleon's work was undone and 
the old order of things was reestablished. With the exception of 
the provinces in the north, which had been given to Austria, the 
peninsula was divided into independent states, such as had existed 
before the Revolution. 

A third matter which occupied the attention particularly of the 
committee on German affairs was the granting of constitutions 
to their subjects by the different sovereigns. In spirit and in 
temper the restored rulers were for the most part the old pre- 
revolutionary despots come to their own again, but thoroughly 
frightened by what had happened. Their desire was to rule in 
the old arbitrary way; but there were those among them who 
recognized that a change had come over the world, and that the 
old absolutism could not with safety be reestablished. The Tsar 
Alexander seemed to entertain some genuine liberal ideas. 

Consequently constitutions were talked about. Louis XVIII 
had been required by the terms of the treaties of Paris to give 
France a constitution, the allies understanding perfectly that if 
the restored Bourbons should attempt to rule as absolute sover- 
eigns there would be trouble again which would unsettle every- 
thing in Europe. And now the Congress recommended to the Ger- 
man princes that representative bodies (AssembHes of Estates) be 
established in each state. But the only states, besides France, 
which at this time actually received constitutions were the Nether- 
lands, Switzerland, Poland, and Norway. 

And even where constitutions already existed or were now 
granted, these charters gave the people very little share in the 
government. They were constitutions of the aristocratic type, 
that is, they placed the government, where its form was monar- 
chical, in the hands of the sovereign and a very small body of 

4 For further details concerning the reorganization of Germany, see sec. 701. 



PRINCE METTERNICH 



585 



voters. Practically the old r^gime.of absolutism was almost every- 
where reestablished. 

But the Revolution had impaired beyond restoration reverence 
for the divine right of kings. An attempt to restore autocratic 
government in Europe was an attempt to restore an outgrown 
cult, — to set up again the fallen Dagon in his place. Notwith- 
standing, the commissioners at Vienna, blind to the spirit and 
tendencies of the times, did set up once more the broken idol, 
— only, however, to see it flung down again by the memorable 
political upheavals of the next half century. The kings had had 
their Congress; the people were 
to have theirs, — in 1820 and '30 
and '48. 

646 . Prince Mettemich, the Incar- 
nation of the Spirit of the Restora- 
tion. — The spirit of the monarchical 
restoration of 18 15, the spirit which 
controlled the Congress of Vienna, 
was incarnate in the celebrated Aus- 
trian minister. Prince Mettemich. 

Metternich hated the Revolution, 
which to him was the spirit of evil 
let loose in the world. The demo- 
cratic spirit he declared to be the Fig. 97. — Prince Metternich 
spirit of disorder which could not (From a painting by ^-.y 77.^^^. 
fail " to change daylight into dark- ^"^^^^^n 
est night." The demand of the people for a share in government 
he regarded as presumptuous, and was wholly convinced that any 
concession to their demands could result in nothing save horrible 
confusion and bloodshed. 

Metternich's system, therefore, was a system of repression. His 
maxim was, Let nothing be changed. A diplomatist of wonder- 
ful astuteness, of wide experience, and possessed of an intimate 
knowledge of the public affairs of all Europe, Metternich ex- 
erted a vast influence upon the history of the years from 18 15 
to 1848. This period might appropriately be called the Age of 




586 CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND METTERNICH 

Metternich. It was due largely to the Prince that during this 
period the old autocratic form of government prevailed so gener- 
ally in Europe. 

647. Metternich and the Holy Alliance. — The activity of Met- 
ternich during the earlier portion of the period of his ascendancy 
was so closely connected with a celebrated league known as the 
Holy Alliance that we must here say a word respecting the origin 
of this association. 

The Holy Alliance was a religious league formed just after the 
fall of Napoleon by the Tsar Alexander and having as its chief 
members Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The ostensible object of 
the league was the maintenance of religion, peace, and order in 
Europe and the reduction to practice in politics of the maxims 
of Christ. The several sovereigns entering into the union promised 
to be fathers to their people, to rule in love and with reference 
solely to the promotion of the welfare of their subjects. 

All this had a very millennial look. But the Holy Alliance very 
soon became practically a league for the maintenance of absolute 
principles of government, in opposition to the liberal tendencies 
of the age. Under the pretext of maintaining religion, justice, 
and order, the sovereigns of the union acted in concert to sup- 
press every aspiration for political liberty among their subjects. 

648. Other Nineteenth-Century Principles, Movements, and Inter- 
ests. — Lest the foregoing paragraphs should create in the mind 
of the reader a wrong impression of nineteenth-century history, we 
must here remind him of what we have said repeatedly, namely, 
that no single formula will suffice to sum up the history of any age. 
History is ever very complex, for many ideas and many forces are 
always simultaneously at work shaping and coloring events. 

The history of the nineteenth century presents a special com- 
plexity. While the great ideas transmitted to the age as a bequest 
from the Revolution were forces that gave the age its chief features, 
still throughout the century various other ideas, principles, and 
interests manifested themselves and contributed greatly to fill par- 
ticularly the later years of the period with a vast complexity of 
movements, — intellectual, political, and industrial. 



NINETEENTH-CENTURY MOVEMENTS 587 

The spirit of the Renaissance was in the society of the period 
a pervasive and powerful influence. Throughout the century intel- 
ligence was becoming more diffused, and modern science, the spe- 
cial product of the Revival of Learning, was constantly revealing 
fresh wonders and arming man with new instruments of research 
and of mastery over nature. 

The true spirit of the Reformation, too, was at work. As the 
century advanced, creeds grew more liberal, and the beneficent 
sentiment of toleration in religion, which has been declared to 
be "the best fruit of the last four centuries," ^ made rapid prog- 
ress in the world. 

Furthermore, the century was marked by a wonderful expansion 
movement of the European peoples, a movement which has given 
the world into the possession of the new and higher civilization 
created by the revolutions of the last three centuries in the home 
land of Europe. To this significant movement we shall devote a 
separate chapter under the heading " The Expansion of Europe." 

Lastly, the nineteenth century witnessed an unparalleled indus- 
trial development, resulting from fortunate mechanical inventions 
and a great variety of other causes. To the phenomena of this 
new movement we shall be able to devote only a few closing para- 
graphs. In these we shall attempt nothing more than merely to 
indicate the relation of this industrial revolution to the general 
development of human society. 

Selections from the Sources, r— Memoirs of Prince Mettemich (trans, by 
Mrs. Alexander Napier), vol. ii, pp. 553-599, and vols, iii-v. These volumes 
cover the years from 181 5 to 1829. They are of the first importance for this 
period. In them the spirit of the Restoration is incarnated. Ford, Life and 
Letters of Madame Krildener. This work lights up a remarkable passage in 
the life of the Russian Emperor Alexander I, and reveals the genesis of the 
Holy Alliance. Translations and Reprints, vol. i, No. 3, " The Restoration 
and the European Policy of Mettemich " (ed. by James Harvey Robinson). 

Secondary Works. — Among the great number of works on nineteenth- 
century history the following are among the best of those in English which 
present in brief survey the whole or some considerable part of the history 

5 The inscription written by President Charles W. Eliot for the Water Gate of the 
World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893. 



588 CONGRESS OF VIENNA AND METTERNlCH 

of the period : Fyffe, A History of Modern Europe, i^g2-i8'/8 ; Phillips, 
Modern Europe, j8i^-i8gg ; Andrews, The Historical Development of 
Modern Europe; Seignobos, A Political History of Europe since 1814; 
Whitcomb, a History of Modern Europe ; Robinson, An Introduction to 
the History of Western Europe ; MuLLER, Political History of Recent Times ; 
and JUDSON, Europe in the Nineteenth Century. 

Biographies and works dealing with some particular subject or some 
limited ■ portion of the nineteenth century: Stephens, Revolutionary 
Europe, iy8g-i8i^, "Introduction," for suggestive paragraphs on the 
principles which have molded nineteenth-century history, and chap, xi, 
for the Congress of Vienna; Malleson, Life of Prince Metternich ; 
Lowell, Governments and Parties in Continental Europe ; and Lodge, 
A History of Modern Europe, chaps, xxv— xxviii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Talleyrand at the Congress of Vienna. 
2. Prince Metternich and his system. 3. Madame Kriidener and the Tsar 
Alexander I. 



CHAPTER XXXVI 

PRANCE SINCE THE SECOND RESTORATION (1815-1905) 

649. Character of the Period. —The social and political history 
of France since the second restoration of the Bourbons may be 
characterized briefly. It has been simply a continuation of the 
Revolution,^— of the struggle between democratic and monarchical 
principles. The aim of the Revolution was to abolish privileges 
and establish rights, —to give every man lot and part in the 
government under which he lives. These liberal ideas and prin- 
ciples have on the whole, notwithstanding repeated reverses, 
gained ground; for revolutions never move backward. There 
may be eddies and countercurrents in a river, but the steady and 
powerful sweep of the stream is ever onward towards the sea. 
Not otherwise is it with the great social and intellectual move- 
ments of history. 

650. The Reign of Louis XVni (i8i5[i4]-i824).— "Your 
king, whose fathers reigned over your fathers for more than eight 
centuries, now returns to devote the rest of his days to defend 
and to comfort you." 

Such were the words used by Louis upon his second return to 
his people after Waterloo. The events of the Hundred Days had 
instructed and humbled him : " I may have made mistakes," he 
said frankly, " and probably have done so." 

Profiting by his experience, Louis ruled throughout a great 
part of the remainder of his reign with reasonable heed to the 
changes effected by the Revolution. But as he grew old and 
infirm he yielded more and more to the extreme Royalist party„ 

1 Each of the revolutions of the period may be characterized as Mettemich charac^ 
terized the Revolution of 1830, ^a,mely, "as nothing else than a recurrence of the 
Revolution of 1789." 

589 



590 FRANCE SINCE THE RESTORATION 

which was again raising its head, and the government entered upon 
a course looking to the restoration of the old order of things. 

651. The Reign of Charles X (182 4- 1830); the Revolution 
of 1830. — Upon the death of Louis in 1824 and the acces- 
sion of Charles X, this reactionary policy soon became more 
pronounced. The new king seemed utterly incapable of profiting 
by the teachings of the past. It was particularly his blind, stub- 
born course that gave point to the saying, "A Bourbon learns 
nothing and forgets nothing." 

It is not necessary for our purpose that we rehearse in detail 
what Charles did or what he failed to do. His aim was to undo 
the work of the Revolution, just as it was the aim of James II in 
England to undo the work of the Puritan Revolution. He dis- 
regarded the constitution, restored the clergy to power, reestab- 
hshed a strict censorship of the press, and changed the laws by 
royal proclamation. He seemed bent on restoring divine-right 
monarchy in France. He declared that he would rather saw 
wood for a living than rule after the fashion of the English kings. 

The outcome of Charles' course might have been foreseen : 
Paris rose in revolt; the streets were blocked with barricades; 
Charles was escorted to the seacoast, whence he took ship for 
England. 

France did not at this time think of a republic. She was 
incHned to try further the experiment of a constitutional mon- 
archy. Louis Philippe, Duke of Orleans, who represented the 
younger branch of the Bourbon family, was placed on the throne 
and the constitution was revised. In the charter which Louis 
XVIII had granted he had styled himself " King of France 3y the 
grace of GodT The new constitution declared Louis Philippe to 
be " King of the French by the grace of God and by the will of 
the nation'' The first principle of the Revolution — the sover- 
eignty of the people — was thus embodied in the fundamental 
law of France. 

Louis Philippe had traveled about the world considerably 
and had lived in a democratic sort of way. He had looked on 
complacently at the taking of the Bastille, had been in America, and 



THE "JULY REVOLUTION" OF 1830 591 

had taught school in Switzerland. The middle classes therefore 
with some reason looked upon him as one of themselves, and gave 
him the title of " Citizen King." 

652. Effect upon Europe of the "July Revolution" of 1830; 
Origin of the Kingdom of Belgium. — France has been called the 
Enceladus of Europe. There is sufficient instruction in the sug- 
gested parable to make it worth our while to recall the myth to 
memory. As fable has it, Enceladus was one of the giants who 
made war upon Olympian Jove. In the rout of the giants, 
Minerva, helping Jove, disabled Enceladus by throwing ^tna on 
top of him and pinning him forever to the earth. The stability 
of things in Sicily was thereby endangered, for as often as the 
giant turned his weary sides the whole island was convulsed. 

France having made war upon the Olympian hierarchy of divine- 
right kings is by them worsted in battle and then pinned to the 
earth with the weight of Bourbonism. As often as the giant 
turns his weary sides there is an eruption, and the whole continent, 
Hke Trinacria of old, trembles to its remotest verge. 

The convulsion in Paris shook all the restored thrones, and 
for a moment threatened to topple into ruins the whole fabric of 
absolutism that had been so carefully upreared by Metternich and 
the other political restorationists of the Congress of Vienna. 

In the Netherlands the artificial order established in 1815 
(sec. 645) was wholly destroyed. The Belgians arose, declared 
themselves independent of Holland, adopted a liberal constitu- 
tion, and elected Leopold of Saxe-Coburg as their king (183 1). 
Thus came into existence the separate kingdom of Belgium. The 
independence and neutrality of the little state was guaranteed by 
all the great powers. 

653. The Revolution of 1848 and the Establishment of the Second 
Republic. — The reign of Louis Philippe up to 1848 was very 
unquiet, yet was not marked by any disturbance of great impor- 
tance. But during all this time the ideas of the Revolution were 
working among the people, and the democratic party was con- 
stantly gaining in strength. Finally, there came a demand for 
the extension of the suffrage. At this time there were only about 



592 FRANCE SINCE THE RESTORATION 

two hundred thousand voters in France, the possession of a certain 
amount of property being required as a qualification for the fran- 
chise. The government steadily refused all electoral reforms. 
Guizot, the king's chief minister, declared that " this world is no 
place for universal suffrage." 

Enceladus at last turned his weary sides. There was a convul- 
sion like that of 1830. The center of this disturbance of course 
was Paris. Louis PhiHppe, thoroughly frightened by the prodigy, 
fled to England. After his departure the Paris mob dragged the 
throne out of the Tuileries and made a bonfire of it. 

The Second Republic was now established, with the poet his- 
torian Lamartine as its provisional Minister for Foreign Affairs. 
A new constitution, some features of which were copied from the 
constitution of the United States, established universal suffrage.^ 
The number of voters was at a stroke increased from a quarter of 
a million to upwards of eight millions. An election being ordered, 
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte,^ a nephew of the great Napoleon, was 
chosen President of the new Republic (Dec. 10, 1848). 

The Paris "February Revolution," as it is called, lighted the 
beacon fires of liberty throughout Europe.* "It is scarcely an 
exaggeration to say that, during the month of March, 1848, not 
a single day passed without a constitution being granted some- 
where." France had made another of her irresistible invasions 
of the states of Europe, — "an invasion of ideas." 

2 There was a socialistic element in this Revolution of '48. It was inaugurated by 
the working classes of Paris. One of the demands of the socialists was that the 
government should find work for the unemployed. National workshops were estab- 
lished by the provisional government, but the experiment was unsuccessful and the 
shops were soon closed. 

3 This man had already played a singular r61e. In 1836 he had appeared suddenly 
at Strasburg, thinking to raise the French garrison there against the government. He 
was'arrested and banished to America. Again in 1840 the adventurer, taking advan- 
tage of the revival of popular interest in the first Napoleon caused by the bringing of 
his ashes from St. Helena to France, made a somewhat similar attempt at revolution 
at Boulogne. He was arrested a second time and condemned to imprisonment for 
life in the fortress of Ham in Picardy. After about five years' confinement he escaped 
and found his way to England. 

4 The revolution in Paris was not so much the cause as merely the signal for revo- 
lutions elsewhere. It imparted fresh energy to revolutionary forces which were ready 
to break forth or which had already found vent in violent explosions. 



THE SECOND EMPIRE 



593 



654. The Second Empire (1852-1870). — The life of the Sec- 
ond Republic spanned only three years. By almost exactly the 
same steps as those by which his uncle had mounted the imperial 
throne, Louis Napoleon now also ascended to the imperial dignity, 
crushing the Republic as he rose. 

A contest having arisen between the President and the National 
Assembly, the President planned a coup d'etat^ — a second Eight- 
eenth Brumaire (sec. 607). He caused the arrest at night of the 
most prominent of the deputies opposed to him in the Assembly 
and such popular leaders in Paris as might incite the people to 
resistance. When the inhabitants of 
the capital awoke in the morning 
(Dec. 2, 185 1) they found the city 
placarded with proclamations an- 
nouncing the dissolution of the 
Assembly and outlining the main 
articles of a new constitution, which 
was to be at once submitted to the 
people for approval. 

The President's appeal to the 
people to indorse what he had done 
met with a most extraordinary re- 
sponse. By a majority of almost 
seven million votes ^ the nation 
approved the President's coup d^etat 
and rewarded him for it by extend- 
ing his term of office to ten years. This was in effect the revival 
of the Consulate of 1799. The next year Louis Napoleon was 
made Emperor, and took the title of Napoleon III (1852). 

The secret of Louis Napoleon's success in his coup d^etat^2iS 
in part the fear that prevailed of the renewal of the Terror of '93, 
and in part the magic power of the name he bore. At just this 
time the name Napoleon was in France a name to conjure with. 
There had been growing up a Napoleonic legend. Time had 
idealized the founder of the First Empire. 

5 The exact vote was 7,481,216 to 684,419. 




Fig. 98. — Napoleon III. (After 
a portrait by F. Winterhalter) 



594 FRANCE SINCE THE RESTORATION 

As the Second and the Third Republic were simply revivals and 
continuations of the First Republic, so was the Second Empire 
merely the revival and continuation of the First Empire. It was 
virtually the same in origin, in spirit, and in policy. 

Louis Napoleon had declared that the Empire meant peace. 
But it meant anything except that. The pages of its history are 
filled with the records of wars. There were three important ones 
in which the armies of the Empire took part, — the Crimean War 



JNrf 




Thiers 

(1853-1856), the Austro- Sardinian War (1859), and the Franco- 
Prussian War (1870-1871). 

The first two of these wars need not detain us at this time, 
since we shall speak of them later in connection with Russian and 
Italian affairs.^ All that need be said here is that in each of them 
Louis Napoleon greatly enhanced his prestige throughout Europe. 
Respecting the causes of the Franco-Prussian War something 
will be said later in connection with the rise of Germany as an 
imperial power (sec. 712), therefore only the chief facts relating 

6 See sees. 694 and 722. 



THE SECOND EMPIRE 595 

to the war itself will be given here. Like the war against Austria, 
this one also was short and decisive. France was invaded by 
three immense German armies. 

One large French army was defeated in the memorable battle 
of Gravelotte (Aug. 18, 1870) and shut up in Metz. Then fol- 
lowed the surrender at Sedan, where eighty-three thousand men, 
including the Emperor himself, gave themselves up as prisoners 
of war^ (Sept. 2, 1870). 

The German columns now advanced to Paris and began the 
investment of the city (Sept. 19, 1870). All reasonable hope of 
a successful defense of the capital was soon destroyed by the sur- 
render to the Germans of Marshal Bazaine at Metz (Oct. 23, 
1870). One hundred and seventy-three thousand soldiers and 
six thousand officers became prisoners of war, — the largest army 
up to this time ever taken captive. 

But Paris held out stubbornly, with great suffering from cold 
and hunger, three months longer ; and then, all outside measures 
for raising the siege having failed, capitulated (Jan. 30, 187 1). 

Outside of Paris, at Bordeaux, was a sort of provisional govern- 
ment headed by M. Thiers, which had been organized after the 
capture of the Emperor. With this body the conquerors carried 
on their negotiations for peace. The terms of the treaty were 
that France should surrender to Germany the Rhenish province 
of Alsace and one half of Lorraine, pay aij indemnity of five 
thousand million francs (about ^1,000,000,000), and consent to 
the occupation of certain portions of French territory until the 
fine was paid. Never before was such a ransom paid by a nation. 

The most lamentable part of the struggle now began. The 
Red Republicans or Communists of Paris,^ rising in insurrection 
against the provisional government both because of what it repre- 
sented — the cause and programme of the conservative, property- 
holding classes — and because of its action in assenting to the 

7 After the war Louis Napoleon found an asylum in England (at Chiselhurst), 
where he died Jan. 9, 1873. 

8 The strength of this party lay in the workingmen of Paris. It was the heir of 
the extreme Republican party of 1848 (sec. 653, n, 2) and in a sense the precursor of 
the socialist party found to-day in almost every country. 



596 THE SECOND RESTORATION 

dismemberment of France, organized a Committee of Public Safety 
in imitation of that of 1793, and called the population of the cap- 
ital to arms. The government finally succeeded in suppressing 
the insurgents, and order was restored, though only after the de- 
struction by fire of many public buildings, and frightful slaughters 
in the streets and squares of the city. 

655. The Third Republic (1870- ). ^ The provisional gov- 
ernment which replaced the Empire was republican in form. 
M. Thiers, the historian, was the first President (1871-1873). 
But not until 1875 was it definitely decided that France should 
be a republic and not a monarchy or an empire. In that year a 
constitution^ was adopted, the tenth since 1791, which provided 
definitely for a republican form of government. 

France has now been continuously under a republican form of 
government since 1870, a longer period of freedom from revolu- 
tion than any other since 1792. The current of political events, 
however, has during this time run somewhat turbulently. There 
have been many changes of presidents ^^ and of ministries, and 
much party rancor has been displayed ; yet in spite of all untoward 
circumstances the cause of the Republic has steadily advanced, 
while that of the Monarchy and that of the Empire have as 
steadily gone backward. Bourbons and Bonapartes, like Stuarts, 
have gone into an exile from which there is no return. 

Many of the difficulties and problems which have confronted 
the Republic were legacies to it from the Monarchy and the 
Empire, or more directly from the Franco-Prussian War. 

An unfortunate heritage from the war that destroyed the Em- 
pire is the Alsace and Lorraine question. The deep resentment 

9 This constitution is not, like our own, a single document, but consists of a series 
of laws passed at different times. As it now stands it provides for a legislature 
of two chambers, a Senate and a Chamber of Deputies, a President elected for seven 
years by the chambers in a joint meeting, and a Cabinet responsible to the legislature. 
The suffrage is universal. 

10 These are the presidents of the Republic since the resignation of Thiers in 
1873: Marshal MacMahon (resigned), 1873-1879 ; M. Grevy (resigned), 1879-1887 ; 
M. Camot (assassinated), 18S7-1894 ; M. Casimir-Perier (resigned), 1894-1895 ; 
M. Felix Faure (died in office), 1895-1899 ; M. Loubet (1899-1906) ; M. Fallieres 
(1906-1913) ; and M. Poincare (1913- )• 



THE THIRD REPUBLIC 597 

felt by the French towards Germany for this mutilation of France, 
together with the fear of further German aggression, caused the 
French government in 1891 to enter into a defensive alliance 
with Russia — an alliance which, as we shall see, was freighted 
with momentous consequences. 

A second legacy to the Republic was influential parties of 
Monarchists and Imperialists, who endeavored in every way to 
discredit the republican regime and watched for an opportunity 
to set up again either the Monarchy or the Empire. The danger- 
ous intrigues of these parties led in 1886 to the expulsion from 
France of all the Bourbon and Bonaparte claimants of the throne 
and their direct heirs. 

A third bequest to the Republic from the ancient regime was the 
educational problem. Before the Revolution, education in France 
was mainly in the hands of the rehgious orders. The Revolution 
swept away these bodies and secularized the educational system. 

The restoration of the Monarchy brought about also the res- 
toration of the rehgious orders. The system of education was 
now mixed, being in part lay and in part clerical. Two wholly 
different spirits were at work in it, — the spirit of the ancient, 
and the spirit of the modern, regime. Among the Liberals a 
strong section demanded the suppression of the clerical schools 
and the complete secularization of education. 

The first of the rehgious associations to suffer was the Society 
of Jesus. In 1880 the convents and schools of the Jesuits were 
closed and the society was expelled from France. In 1903 fifty- 
four religious orders of men, embracing teaching, preaching, and 
commercial associations, were suppressed. Over two thousand 
convents were closed. The wisdom as well as the justice of this 
censorship of teaching may well be questioned. 

The Republic has also had troubles which can in no sense be 
regarded as an inheritance from the ancient regime. During the 
years 1889-189 2 all France was shaken by a great scandal arising 
from the gross mismanagement and failure of a company organ- 
ized by Ferdinand de Lesseps, who had won great fame by the 
successful construction of the Suez Canal, for the digging of a 



598 THE SECOND RESTORATION 

similar canal at the Isthmus of Panama. After the expenditure of 
upwards of ^260,000,000, with the work in a very unsatisfactory 
condition, the company became bankrupt. It then developed that 
bribery and corruption on a scale as gigantic as the undertaking 
itself had been resorted to by the promoters of the enterprise. 
Prosecutions followed. Among those condemned to severe punish- 
ment was Ferdinand de Lesseps himself. He was already dying 
Itrom age and worry when this final blow fell upon him. It was a 
pathetic ending of a career which, aside from this last deplorable 
incident, is one of the most illustrious in modern French history .^^ 
As to the part which France has taken in recent colonial enter- 
prises, particularly in the opening up to civilization of the conti- 
nent of Africa, we shall find it more convenient to speak in another 
connection (Chapter XLIII). 

Selections from the Sources. — Forbes, My Experience of the War 
between France and Germany ; Bingham, Journal of the Siege of Paris. 
A graphic account of the siege by an Englishman who remained in Paris 
in order "to observe the conduct of the citizens." For material for a 
systematic study of the period, the special student should turn to Ander- 
son, Constitutions and other Select Documents. 

Secondary Works. — In most of the works cited for the preceding 
chapter will be found chapters and sections dealing with French affairs 
during the period under review. To these authorities add the following : 
Martin, A Popular History of France, vols, ii (last part) and iii ; Hanotaux, 
Contemporary France; Bodley, France (a study of political institutions) ; 
Dickinson, Revolution and Reaction in Modern France ; Coubertin, The 
Evolution of France under the Third Republic ; and Lebon and Pelet, 
France as it is. 

For the Second Empire : Jerrold, The Life of Napoleon III, and 
Forbes, The Life of Napoleon the Third. 

For brief summaries of the events of the period : Lebon, Modern France, 
chaps, viii-xvi; Duruy, A History of France ; Adams, The Growth of the 
French Nation, chap, xviii ; and Hassall, The French People, chaps, xviii- 
xxi and xxiii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Louis Napoleon before 1848. 2. The 
Paris Commune of 1871. 3. Alfred Dreyfus. 4. Ferdinand de Lesseps 
and the Panama Canal. 5. France and the Vatican. 

11 Another unfortunate affair belonging to this period is the case of Alfred Drey- 
fus, a young Jewish captain of artillery in the French army, who became the victim of 
a cruel and unjust sentence by a military coiurt. The story is too long for recital here. 




Fig. 99. — Queen Victoria as a Young Woman 
(After a painting by Patridge) 



CHAPTER XXXVII 
ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO (1815-1905) 

656. The Four Chief Matters. — English history during the nine- 
teenth century embraces a multitude of events. A short chapter 
covering the entire period will possess no instructive value unless 
it reduces the heterogeneous mass of facts to some sort of unity 
by placing events in relation with their causes, and thus shows 
how they are connected with a few broad national movements 
or tendencies. 

Studying the period in this way, we shall find that very many 
of its leading events may be summed up under the four follow- 
ing heads: (i) progress towards democracy; (2) extension of 
the principle of religious equality ; (3) England's relations with 
Ireland ; and (4) the growth of the British colonial empire. 

We shall attempt nothing more in the present chapter than to 
indicate the most prominent matters that should claim the stu- 
dent's attention along the first three lines of inquiry, reserving 
for later sections the consideration of England's colonial affairs.. 

599 



6oo ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 



I. Progress towards Democracy 

657. Introductory. — The English Revolution of 1688 trans- 
ferred authority from the king to the Parliament. The elective 
branch of that body, however, rested upon a very narrow elect- 
oral basis. Out of upwards of five million Englishmen who should 
have had a voice in the government, less than two hundred thou- 
sand were voters, and these were chiefly of the rich upper classes. 
The political democratizing of England during the nineteenth 
century consists in the widening of the electorate, — in the giving 
to every intelligent and honest man a right to vote, to participate 
in the government under which he lives. 

658. Effects of the French Revolution upon Liberalism in Eng- 
land ; Reform versus Revolution. — The French Revolution at 
first gave a fresh impulse to liberal tendencies. The English 
Liberals watched the course of the French Republicans with the 
deepest interest and sympathy. It will be recalled how the states- 
man Fox rejoiced at the fall of the Bastille, and what auguries of 
hope he saw in that event (sec. 567). The young writers, Cole- 
ridge, Wordsworth, and Southey, were'all infected with democratic 
sentiments and inspired with a generous enthusiasm for political 
liberty and equality. But the wild excesses of the French levelers 
terrified the English Liberals. There was a sudden revulsion of 
feeling. Liberal sentiments were denounced as dangerous and 
revolutionary. 

But in a few years after the downfall of Napoleon the terrors of 
the French Revolution were forgotten. Liberal sentiments began 
to spread among the masses. The people very justly complained 
that, while the English government claimed to he a government 
of the people, they had no part in it. 

Now, it is instructive to note the different ways in which 
Liberalism was dealt with by the English government and by 
the rulers on the Continent. In the continental countries the 
rising spirit of democracy was met by cruel and despotic repres- 
sions. The people were denied by their rulers all participation 
in the affairs of government. We have seen the result of this 



THE REFORM BILL OF 1832 6oi 

policy in France, and later shall see the outcome of it in other 
continental countries. Liberalism triumphed indeed at last, but 
triumphed only through revolution. 

In England the government did not resist the popular demands 
to the point of revolution. It made timely concessions to the 
growing spirit of democracy. Hence here, instead of a series of 
revolutions we have a series of reform measures which, gradually 
popularizing the House of Commons, at last rendered the English 
nation, not alone in name but in reality, a self-governing people. 

659. The Reform Bill of 1832. — The first Parliamentary step 
in reform was taken in 1832. To understand this important act 
a glance backward becomes necessary. 

When, in 1265, the Commons were first admitted to Parlia- 
ment, members were called only from those cities 'and boroughs 
whose wealth and population fairly entitled them to representa- 
tion. In the course of time some of these places dwindled in 
population and new towns sprang up ; yet the decayed boroughs 
retained their ancient privilege of sending members to Parlia- 
ment, while the new towns were left entirely without represen- 
tation. Thus Old Sarum, an ancient town now utterly decayed 
and without a single inhabitant, was represented in the Commons 
by two members. Furthermore, the sovereign, for the purpose 
of gaining influence in the Commons, had, from time to time, 
given unimportant places the right of returning members to the 
Lower House. It was inevitable that elections in these small or 
"pocket boroughs," as they were called, should almost always 
be determined by the corrupt influence of the crown or of the 
great landowners. The Lower House of Parliament was thus 
filled with the nominees of the king, or with persons who had 
bought their seats, often with little effort at concealment. At 
the same time, such large, recently-grown manufacturing towns 
as Birmingham, Leeds, and Manchester had no representation 
at all in the Commons. 

Agitation was begun for the reform of this corrupt and farcical 
system of representation. The movement was greatly aided and 
given a more popular character than any earlier reform agitation 



602 ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 

by the great newspapers which had come into existence during 
the latter part of the eighteenth century. The contest between 
Whigs and Tories, or Liberals and Conservatives, was long and 
bitter, the Conservatives opposing all reform and denying that 
there was any necessity for it. The excited state of the public 
feeling may be inferred from the following description by Lord 
Macaulay of the scene in the House of Commons upon the pas- 
sage in that chamber of the first Reform Bill (183 1) : "Such a 
scene as the division of last Tuesday," he says, " I never saw, 
and never expect to see again. ... It was like seeing Csesar 
stabbed in the Senate-house, or seeing Oliver taking the mace 
from the table; a sight to be seen only once, and never to be 
forgotten. . . . The ayes and noes were like two volleys of 
cannon from ' opposite sides of a field of battle." 

At last public feeling became so strong and menacing that the 
Lords, who were blocking the measure in the Upper House, were 
forced to yield, and the Reform Bill of 1832 became a law. By 
this act the English electoral system was radically changed. 
Eighty-six of the " rotten boroughs " were disfranchised or semi- 
disfranchised and the hundred and forty- two seats in the Lower 
House taken from them were given to different counties and to 
large towns hitherto unrepresented. The bill also somewhat 
increased the number of electors by extending the right of voting 
to all persons in the towns owning or leasing property of a cer- 
tain value, and by lowering the property qualification of voters in 
the counties. 

The importance of this reform bill can hardly be exaggerated. 
It is the Magna Carta of English political democracy.^ 

1 The reform of the House of Commons gave an impulse to legislation of an 
humanitarian and popular character. In 1833 ^^ ^-^t was passed in the British Com- 
mons for the abolition of slavery. Nearly 800,000 slaves, chiefly in the British West 
Indies, were freed at a cost to the English nation of ^20,000,000. This same year 
(1833) the first effective Factory Act was passed. This was the beginning of a long 
series of laws which gradually corrected the almost incredible abuses, particularly 
in connection with the employment of children, which had crept into the English 
factory system. A similar series of laws regulated labor in the mines. Also this same 
year Parliament voted an annual grant of ^20,000 to aid in the erection of school- 
bouses. This was the first step taken by the English government in the promotion of 



THE MUNICIPAL REFORM ACT OF 1835 603 

660. The Municipal Reform Act of 1835. — The government 
of the EngHsh towns of this period needed reform as urgently as 
had the British ParHament. This municipal system was a system 
inherited from the Middle Ages. Most of the towns were ruled by 
corrupt oligarchies. Long agitation for their overthrow resulted 
in the passing of the Municipal Reform Act of 1835. This act 
accomplished for the government of the cities what the Reform Bill 
of 1832 had effected for the general government of the kingdom. 
It transformed the cities from grotesque, iniquitous oligarchies 
into something like democracies, wherein the government was in 
the hands of a mayor and a council elected by the townsmen. 

661. Chartism: the Revolutionary Year of 1848. — Although 
the Reform Bill of 1832 was almost revolutionary in the princi- 
ple it established, still it went only a little way in the application 
of that principle. It admitted to the franchise the middle classes 
only. The great laboring class were given no part in the govern- 
ment. They now began an agitation, characterized by much 
bitterness, known as Chartism, from a document called the 
"People's Charter," which embodied the reforms they desired. 
These were "universal suffrage, vote by ballot, annual parlia- 
ments, the division of the country into equal electoral districts, 
the abolition of the property qualification of members, and pay- 
ment for their services." 

The agitation for these changes in the constitution went on 
with more or less violence until 1848, in which year, encouraged 
by the revolutions then shaking almost every throne on the 
European continent, the Chartists indulged in riotous demonstra- 
tions, which frightened the law-abiding citizens and brought 
discredit upon themselves. Their organization now fell to pieces. 
The reforms, however, which they had labored to secure, were, in 
the main, desirable and just, and the most important of them have 
since been adopted and made a part of the English constitution. 

public education. In 1846 England, by the repeal of her " corn laws," abandoned the 
commercial policy of protection, which favored the great landowners, and adopted 
that of free trade. The chief advocates of this important measure were Richard 
Cobden and John Bright. The enactment of the law was hastened by the blight of 
the potato crop in Ireland and consequent famine in the island. 



604 ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 

662. The Reform Bill of 1867 ^^^ the Education Act of 1870. 

— The Reform Bill of 1867 was simply another step taken by 
the English government in the direction of the Reform Bill of 
1832. Like that measure, it was passed only after long and vio- 
lent agitation and discussion both without and within the walls 
of Parliament. The main effect of the bill was the extension of 
the right of voting, — the enfranchisement of the great " fourth 
estate." 

As after the Reform Bill of 1832, so now the attention of Par- 
liament was directed to the matter of public instruction ; for all 
recognized that universal education must go along with universal 
suffrage. Three years after the passage of this second reform 
bill, ParHament passed an education act (1870) which aimed to 
provide an elementary education for every child in the British 
Isles by investing the local authorities with power to establish and 
maintain schools and compel the attendance of the children. 

663. The Reform Bill of 1884. — One of the conservative 
leaders, the Earl of Derby, in the discussions upon the Reform 
Bill of 1867, said, " No doubt we are making a great experiment, 
and taking a leap in the dark." Just seventeen years after the 
passage of that bill the English people were ready to take another 
leap. But they were not now leaping in the dark. The wisdom 
and safety of admitting the lower classes to a share in the govern- 
ment had been demonstrated. 

In 1884 Mr. Gladstone, then Prime Minister, introduced and 
pushed to a successful vote a new reform bill more radical and 
sweeping in its provisions than any preceding one. It increased 
the number of voters from about three millions to five miUions. 
The quaUfication of voters in the counties was made the same as 
that required of voters in the boroughs. Hence its effect was to 
enfranchise the great agricultural classes. 

A redistribution bill, which was passed in connection with the 
reform bill, rearranged the electoral districts in such manner 
that the Commons should more fairly represent the popular will. 
The number of members from the boroughs was lessened and the 
number from the counties increased. 



REFORM OF RURAL LOCAL GOVERNMENT 605 

664. The Reform of Rural Local Government. — Parliament 
and the government of the municipalities were now fairly democ- 
ratized. The rural districts were the last to feel the influence of 
the liberal movement that was so profoundly reconstructing in 
the interest of the masses the governmental institutions of the 
United Kingdom. But the movement finally reached these, and 
the work of democratic reconstruction has been rounded out and 
completed by different acts of Parliament,^ which have put more 
directly into the hands of the people of each of the smaller sub- 
divisions of the realm the management of their local affairs. 

665. Only the Forms of Monarchy remain The English gov- 
ernment in its local as well as in its national branches is now in 
reality as democratic as our own. Only the forms of the aristo- 
cratic monarchy remain. It does not seem possible that these, 
in spite of the English love of ancient forms, can always with- 
stand the encroachments of democracy. Hereditary right and 
privilege, as represented by the House of Lords and the Crown, 
must in time be abolished. Even now whenever the Lords attempt 
to thwart the will of the Commons there are ominous threats of 
abohshing the Upper House, as at present constituted. It seems 
inevitable that these monarchical and aristocratic forms, repre- 
senting as they do an old order of things, should give way to 
purely modern democratic institutions ; for, as the advocates of 
popular self-government maintain, the republic is the logical form 
of the democratic state. 



II. Extension of the Principle of Religious 
Equality 

666. Religious Freedom and Religious Equality.- — : Alongside 
the political movement traced in the preceding section ran a similar 
one in the religious realm. This was a growing recognition by the 
English people of the true principle of religious toleration. 

2 The most important of these statutes are the Local Government Act of 1888 (for 
England and Wales), the Local Government Act of 1889 (for Scotland), the Local 
Government Act of 1898 (for Ireland), and the Parish Council Act of 1894. 



6o6 ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 

At the opening of the nineteenth century there was in England 
rehgious freedom, but no religious equality. That is to say, one 
might be a Catholic or a Protestant dissenter without fear of 
persecution. Dissent from the Established Church was not unlaw- 
ful; but one's being a Catholic or a Protestant nonconformist 
disqualified him from holding certain public offices. Where there 
exists such discrimination against any religious sect, or where 
any one sect is favored or sustained by the government, there of 
course is no religious equality^ although there may be religious 
freedom. 

Progress in this direction, then, will consist in the growth of a 
really tolerant spirit, which shall lead to the removal of all civil 
disabilities from Catholics, Protestant dissenters and Jews, and 
the placing of all sects on an absolute equality before the law. 

667. Methodism and its Effects upon Toleration. — One thing 
that helped to bring prominently forward the question of emanci- 
pating nonconformists from the civil disabilities under which they 
were placed, was the great religious movement known as Metho- 
dism (sec. 539). By vastly increasing the body of Protestant dis- 
senters, Methodism gave new strength to the agitation for the 
repeal of the laws which bore so heavily upon them. So now 
began a series of legislative acts which made a more and more 
perfect appHcation of the great principle of religious equality. 
We shall simply refer to two or three of the most important of 
these measures. 

668. Disabilities removed from Protestant Dissenters (1828). — 
One of the earliest and most important of the acts of Parliament 
in this century in recognition of the principle of religious equality 
was the repeal of the Corporation and Test acts, in so far as they 
bore upon Protestant dissenters. These were acts passed in the 
reign of Charles II, which required every officer of a corporation, 
and all persons holding civil and mihtary positions, to take cer- 
tain oaths and partake of the communion according to the rites 
of the Anglican Church. It is true that these laws were not now 
strictly enforced ; nevertheless, the laws were invidious and vexa- 
tious, and the Protestant dissenters demanded their repeal. 



DISABILITIES REMOVED FROM CATHOLICS 607 

Those opposed to the repeal argued that the principle of reli- 
gious toleration did not require it. They insisted that, where 
every one has perfect freedom of worship, it is no infringement 
of the principle of toleration for the government to refuse to 
employ as a public servant one who dissents from the State 
Church. The result of the debate in Parliament was the repeal 
of such parts of the ancient acts as it was necessary to rescind in 
order to relieve Protestant dissenters. 

669. Disabilities removed from the Catholics (1829). — The 
bill of 1828 gave no rehef to CathoHcs. They were still excluded 
from Parliament and various civil offices by the declarations of 
belief and the oaths required of office holders, — declarations and 
oaths which no good Catholic could conscientiously make.^ They 
now demanded that the same concessions be made them that had 
been granted Protestant dissenters. 

A threatened revolt on the part of the Irish Catholics hurried 
through Parliament the progress of what was known as the " Cath- 
olic Emancipation Act." This law opened Parliament and all 
the offices of the kingdom, below the Crown, — save that of 
Regent, of Lord High Chancellor of England and Ireland, of 
Lord Deputy of Ireland, and a few others, — to the Catholic 
subjects of the realm. 

670. Disabilities removed from the Jews (1858). — Persons 
professing the Jewish religion were still laboring under all the dis- 
abilities which had now been removed from Protestant dissenters 
and Catholics. In 1858 an act (Jewish Relief Act) was passed by 
Parliament which so changed the oath required of a person taking 
office — the oath contained the words, " Upon the true faith of a 
Christian " — as to open all public positions, except a few special 
offices, to persons of the Jewish faith. 

671. Disestablishment of the Irish Church (1869). — Forty 
years after the Catholic Emancipation Act the English govern- 
ment took another great step in the direction of religious equality 
by the disestablishment of the State Church in Ireland. 

8 In England Catholics were excluded from the privilege of voting as well as from 
the holding of office. 



6o8 ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 



The Irish have always and steadily refused to accept the religion 
which their English conquerors have somehow felt constrained to 
try to force upon them. The vast majority of the people are 
to-day, and ever have been, CathoHcs ; yet up to the time where 
we have now arrived these Irish Catholics had been compelled 
to pay tithes and fees for the maintenance among them of the 
Anglican Church worship. Meanwhile their own churches, in 

which the great masses were 
instructed and cared for 
spiritually, had to be kept up 
by voluntary contributions. 

The rank injustice iii thus 
forcing the Irish Catholics to 
support a Church in which 
they not only did not believe 
but which they regarded with 
special aversion and hatred 
as the symbol of their sub- 
jection and persecution, was 
perceived and declaimed 
against by many among the 
English Protestants them- 
selves. 

The proposal to do away 
with this grievance by the 
disestablishment of the State 
Church in Ireland was bit- 
FiG. loo. — Lord Beaconsfield (Dis- terly opposed by the Con- 
RAELi), "The Courtier Premier" gervatives, headed by Lord 

at length, after a memorable 
debate, the Liberals, under the lead of Bright and Gladstone, the 
latter then Prime Minister, carried the measure. This was in 
1869, but the actual disestablishment was not to take place until 
the year 187 1, at which time the Irish Church, ceasing to exist 
as a state institution, became a free Episcopal Church. The 




ENGLAND'S RELATIONS WITH IRELAND 609 

historian May pronounces this " the most important ecclesiastical 
matter since the Reformation." 

672. Proposed Disestablishment of the State Church in England 
and Scotland. ■ — The perfect application of the principle of reli- 
gious equaHty demands, in the opinion of many EngHsh Liberals, 
the disestablishment of the State Church in England and Scotland."* 
They feel that for the government to maintain any particular sect 
is to give the state a monopoly in religion. They would have the 
churches of all denominations placed on an absolute equality. 
Especially in Scotland is the sentiment in favor of disestablishment 
very strong. 

III. England's Relations with Ireland 

673' Legislative Union of Great Britain and Ireland (1800). — 
The history of Ireland in the nineteenth century, like her history 
in all preceding centuries, is in the main a story of Irish grievances 
against England. These grievances have for the most part arisen 
out of three distinct yet closely related subject-matters, — religion. 
Home Rule, and the land. Concerning the religious grievances 
of the Irish and their redress we have already spoken in connec- 
tion with the general religious emancipation movement in Eng- 
land. For an understanding of the subject of Irish Home Rule 
a. glance backward at Irish parliamentary history is necessary. 

Ireland, it will be recalled, secured legislative independence of 
England in 1782 (sec. 542). When, a little later. Napoleon came 
to the head of affairs in France, there was apprehension on the 
part of English statesmen lest he should utilize Irish discontent 
to secure a foothold in the islands. As a measure of precaution 
the English government resolved to get rid of the Irish Parliament. 
By wholesale bribery its members were induced to pass a sort of 
self-denying ordinance whereby the Parliament was abolished, or 
rather merged with that of Great Britain, Ireland being given repre- 
sentation at Westminster. The two islands were henceforth to bear 
the name of " The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland." 

4 The Established Church in Scotland is the Presbyterian. 



6lO ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 

674. Agitation for the Repeal of the Union. — The great body of 
Irish patriots did not at the time of these transactions admit, nor 
have they at any time since admitted, the vaUdity of the Act of 
Union whereby their Parliament was taken from them. In the early 
forties the agitation for the repeal of the Union and the reestab- 
lishment of their native legislature assumed, under the incitement 
of the eloquence of the Irish patriot Daniel O'Connell, almost the 
character of a rebellion. Some years later, in the sixties, the agita- 
tion was carried to the point of actual insurrection, but the move- 
ment was quickly suppressed and its leaders punished. 

675. Gladstone and Home Rule for Ireland. — It was not long 
before the Irish question Was again to the front. In 1886 Wil- 
liam Ewart Gladstone became for the third time Prime Minister. 
Almost his first act was the introduction in the Commons of a 
Home Rule bill for Ireland. The main feature of this measure 
was an Irish legislature sitting at Dublin, . to which was to be 
intrusted the management of all exclusively Irish affairs. 

The chief arguments urged by the opponents of the bill were 
that an Irish legislature would deal unfairly with English landlords 
in Ireland, would oppress the Protestant portion of the population, 
and, above all, in time of national distress would sever Ireland from 
the British Empire. 

After a long debate the bill was rejected by the Commons 
(1886). Gladstone appealed to the country. The elections re- 
sulted in his defeat. Lord Salisbury became the head of the 
next cabinet. 

The agitation for Irish Home Rule, however, went on. In 1892 
the elections resulted in bringing Gladstone to the premiership 
for the fourth time. He now brought in a new Home Rule bill 
(1893), which in its essential features was like his first. There 
followed a long and bitter debate between the partisans of the 
measure and its opponents. The bill passed the Commons, but 
was rejected by the House of Lords by an almost unanimous vote. 

The following year, owing to the infirmities of advanced age, 
Gladstone laid down the burdens of the premiership and retired 
from public life. He died in 1898 at the age of eighty-eight, 



IRISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT BILL 6ll 

and, amidst unusual demonstrations of national grief, was buried 
in Westminster Abbey. His name has a sure place among the 
great names in Enghsh history. 

676. Irish Local Government Bill (1898). — The cause of Irish 
Home Rule seemed to have descended into the tomb with Glad- 
stone. The Conservative ministry of Lord Salisbury, however, in 




Fig. ioi. — William Ewart Gladstone. (After a painting 
by Lenback) 

1898, hoping to satisfy in a measure Irish demands, enacted a 
law which created local governing bodies in Ireland, like those 
which had then recently been established in other parts of the 
United Kingdom (sec. 664). 

The Irish had good reason in this matter to fear the Tories 
bringing gifts. One purpose of the Conservatives in this piece 



6l2 ENGLAND SINCE THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 

of legislation was " to kill Home Rule with kindness " ; that is, 
by the creation of a number of local councils, to induce the Irish 
to cease their clamor for a general legislature for Ireland. 

In 19 1 2 the Government of Ireland Bill, as it was named, was 
introduced by Mr. Asquith. It provided for a bicameral parliament 
to sit at Dublin. For two years the bill was bitterly debated both 
in the Commons and in the House of Lords, amendments were pro- 
posed and rejected, and, finally, on May 25, 19 14, the unamended 
bill became law. Later in the year Mr. Asquith's Amendment Act, 
allowing Ulster counties to decide for themselves whether or not 
they wished to be under the Dublin Parliament, was passed, but 
its operation was postponed for one year. But the question was 
by no means settled, and feeling for and against the bill ran so high 
in Ireland that civil war seemed imminent. The entrance of Great 
Britain into the war of 19 14 postponed application of the law. 

677. Agrarian Troubles and Agrarian Legislation. — It is the 
opinion of many students of the Irish Question that it is at bottom 
an economic rather than a political one, and that if Irish economic 
grievances were removed, the Irish would cease to care for Home 
Rule. 

It is certainly true that very much of Irish misery and discon- 
tent arises from absentee landlordism. A great part of the soil 
of Ireland is owned by a few hundred English proprietors, who 
represent, in the main, either as heirs or as purchasers, those 
English and Scotch settlers to whom the lands confiscated from 
the natives were given at the time of the Cromwellian and other 
Protestant " settlements " of the island. Before the recent relief 
legislation, of which we shall speak directly, it was often the case 
that the agents of these absentee landlords dealt harshly with 
their tenants and exacted as rent every penny that could be 
wrung from their poverty. If a tenant made improvements upon 
the land he tilled, and by ditching and subduing it increased 
its productive power, straightway his rent was raised. If he 
failed to pay the higher rent, he was evicted. The records of 
" evictions " form a sad chapter in the history of the Irish 
peasantry. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 613 

A long series of Irish land laws marks the efforts of the British 
Parliament to alleviate the distress of the Irish tenant farmers. 
In 1903 an Irish land-purchase bill, more sweeping and liberal 
than any preceding measure, was enacted into a law. This law 
differs from earlier ones in the provision that peasants desiring 
to buy their holdings shall be aided, not merely by a government 
loan on long time and low interest, but further by the govern- 
ment itself paying a part of the purchase price. In 1909 the 
Amendment Land Purchase Act was passed, granting a further 
sum of ^52,000,000 for immediate use and a practically unlimited 
amount for the future. These liberal nieasures promise to convert 
nearly half a million of Irish tenants into proprietors and thus wholly 
revolutionize the relation of the Irish peasantry to the Irish soil. 

Selections from the Sources. — Lee, Source-Book, pp. 483-541; Ken- 
dall, Source-Book, chaps, xx andxxi; and CoLBY, Selections, Nos. 11 3-1 17." 
The most important documents for the period will be found in Adams and 
Stephens, Select Documents of Etiglish Constitutional History, pp. 497-555. 

Secondary Works. — For Parliamentary reform : May, The Constitutional 
History of England; Gammage, History of the Chartist Movement, i8j'/-S4; 
McCarthy, The Epoch of Reform ; Carlyle, Chartism ; and Dickinson, 
The Development of Parliament during the Nineteetith Century. 

•For Irish matters : Lecky, History of Ireland in the Eighteenth Century, 
vol. V, chaps, xii and xiii, for the legislative union of England and Ireland ; 
Two Centuries of Irish History, i6gi-i8yo, by different writers, with an 
Introduction by James Bryce ; Dicey, England's Case against Hoffie Rule; 
McCarthy, Ireland since the Union; and King, The Irish Question. 

Biographies : Morley, The Life of Richard Cobden and The Life of 
William Ewart Gladstone. In the last biography (vol. i, pp. 635-640), read 
the remarkable letter of young Gladstone to his father on the choice of 
a profession. Brandes, Lord Beaconsfield. It will hardly be necessary 
again to remind the reader of the Dictionary of National Biography. 

For the social, intellectual, and industrial life of the period: Traill, 
Social England, vol. vi ; and Cheyney, An Introduction to the Social History 
of England, chaps, viii-x. For a general review of the events of the period : 
McCarthy, History of our Own Times. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Lord Beaconsfield, the courtier Premier. 
2. Gladstone, the Liberal Premier. 3. John Bright, the orator. 4. Daniel 
O'Connell, the Irish patriot. 5. The potato famine in Ireland. 6. Factory 
reform. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII 
SPAIN AND THE REVOLT OF HER AMERICAN COLONIES 

678. Effects of Napoleon's Invasion of Spain. — The plan of 
our work permits us to touch upon only those passages in nine- 
teenth-century Spanish history which, through their relation to 
the French Revolution or to the general democratic movement 
since 181 5, constitute a part. of universal history. 

The invasion of Spain by Napoleon in 1808 (sec. 630), wanton 
as was this attack upon Spanish nationality, resulted ultimately 
in the destruction there of the old corrupt absolute monarchical 
system. As an outcome of the national uprising against the 
French invaders, the country received from the Spanish patriot 
party a charter of liberty known as the Constitution of 18 12. 
The maxims and principles underlying this instrument were like 
those embodied in the French Constitution of 1791. This marks 
the beginning of constitutional government in Spain. 

679. The Bourbon Restoration and the Revolution of 1820- 
1823. — The Restoration of 181 4 brought back the Bourbons 
in the person of Ferdinand VII. Ferdinand was an absolutist. 
Straightway he set about the restoration of the old regime. He 
abolished the constitution, dissolved the Cortes or National 
Assembly, and banished or imprisoned the leaders of the Liberal 
party. This policy of reaction and repression was met in 1820 
by an uprising of the Liberals. The insurgents proclaimed the 
Constitution of 181 2, and forced the king to swear to rule 
henceforth in accordance with its provisions. 

■ But the absolute sovereigns of Europe would not allow the 
Spanish people to have a constitutional government. They 
regarded the setting up of such a system in the peninsula as a 
menace to their own system of absolutism. They met in 

614 



REVOLT OF SPAIN'S AMERICAN COLONIES 615 

conference^ and France was assured of the support of Austria, 
Russia, and Prussia, if she should undertake to suppress the Hberal 
movement. A French army at once crossed the Pyrenees. The 
constitutional government was overthrown and Ferdinand was 
restored to his former authority as an absolute ruler.^ 

For ten years the old regime was in force in all its rigor. 
Thousands of Liberals were immured in dungeons or driven into 
exile. The monasteries, which had been suppressed during the 
French regime, were reopened. The Inquisition, which had also 
been abolished, was reestablished. The people were forbidden 
to read foreign books, which were presumably filled with the 
contagion of democratic ideas. 

680. The Revolt of Spain's American Colonies. — At the opening 
of the nineteenth century Spain's system of government in her 
over-the-sea dependencies was based on the seventeenth-century 
maxim that colonies exist for the sake of the mother country. 
The colonists were forbidden to trade with any country save the 
home land. All the chief offices in State and Church were filled 
by persons born in Spain.; the Creoles, that is Spaniards born 
in the colonies, were allowed no part in the government. The 



1 During these troubled times the sovereigns of the great powers, either in person 
or by representatives, met in three celebrated conferences, — the Congress of Troppau 
(1820), the Congress of Laibach (1821), and the Congress of Verona (1822). It was 
at the Verona conference that action was taken concerning the state of affairs in 
Spain. England, jealous of French Influence in the peninsula, protested against the 
proposed intervention, and withdrew from the congress. 

2 The revolution in Spain incited a like movement in Portugal. It will be recalled 
that when the French invaded Portugal in 1807 the royal family fled to Brazil (sec. 
629). The seat of government was not retransferred to the home country in 1815^ 
but Portugal was governed from Brazil as though it were a dependency of the 
colony. This situation was naturally displeasing to the people of Portugal. In 1820 
the dissatisfaction culminated in a revolution. The insurgents proclaimed a liberal 
constitution. King John VI, urged to return from Brazil, finally set sail for Portugal. 
Upon his arrival he was constrained to take an oath to observe the new constitution. 
Then followed a long troubled period. Only since the middle of the nineteenth cen- 
tury can the country be said to have had anything like a regular constitutional govern- 
ment. The country remained a kingdom until 1910. In 1908 King Carlos (whose 
reign had been filled with tyranny) and the crown prince were murdered in Lisbon. 
Manuel II succeeded to the throne, but two years later was forced to flee to Eng- 
land, and in 191 1 the Portuguese Republic was established, with Manuel Arriaga as 
its first president. 



6l6 SPAIN AND HER AMERICAN COLONIES 

Indians and half-breeds, who formed the great bulk of the popu- 
lation, were held in a kind of serfdom. Negro slavery prevailed 
in all the colonies. The Inquisition was maintained in all its rigor. 
A jealous censorship of the press prevented all free expression of 
opinion. 

This oppressive and arbitrary system of government did not fail 
to arouse in the colonies a spirit of protest and rebelhon. The 
successful revolt of the English colonies in the North and the 
French Revolution gave a great impulse to this revolutionary 
movement in all the Spanish-American countries. The invasion of 
Spain by the French in 1808 was the signal for insurrection. 
Taking advantage of the deposition of their king (sec. 630), the 
colonists rose in revolt, demanding reforms and a share in public 
affairs. When the Napoleonic Wars ended in 1815 Spain had 
almost suppressed these insurrections against her authority. 

Then came the Restoration which placed the Bourbon Ferdi- 
nand VII upon the Spanish throne. Had he made wise con- 
cessions to the colonists, they might have been held in their 
allegiance. Just the opposite course was followed, which resulted 
in fanning into a fierce flame the smoldering embers of insurrec- 
tion. The Revolution of 1820 in Spain imparted fresh energy to 
the outbreak. The aim of the colonists now was not simply a 
redress of grievances but a severance of all pohtical relations with 
the mother country. 

The details of this war of Spanish colonial independence 
belong to the special histories of Spain and her colonies. In the 
next paragraph we shall touch upon only a single international 
phase of the conflict, which throws a strong side light upon the 
great struggle at this time going on in Europe between the 
absolute rulers and the people. 

681. The Holy Alliance and the Monroe Doctrine. — The prin- 
ciples of absolutism in government having been asserted anew in 
Spain,^ the sovereigns of the Holy Alliance now turned their 
attention to the New World. They began to discuss the project of 
aiding Spain to reduce to obedience her rebellious colonies. 

8 And ako in Italy (sec. 686). 



THE MONROE DOCTRINE 617 

These deliberations of the absolute sovereigns mark a critical 
moment in the history of the New World and of the cause of 
popular self-government. The threatened interference by the Old 
World monarchies in New World affairs awakened the apprehen- 
sion of the government of the United States. John Quincy Adams, 
then Secretary of State, declared that " if the Holy AUiance sub- 
dues Spanish America, the ultimate result of the undertaking will 
be not to set up the standard of Spain but to portion out the 
continent among themselves. Russia might take California, Peru, 
and Chile, and thus make the Pacific a Russian lake." 

Such was the situation when in 1823 President Monroe issued 
his famous message. After referring to the gloomy outlook for 
Liberalism in the Old World and to the despotic system of govern- 
ment represented by the Holy Alliance, he said : " We owe it, 
therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between 
the United States and those powers [the "Holy AlHes"], to 
declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to ex- 
tend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous 
to our peace and safety." 

This is the essential part of the celebrated Monroe Doctrine as 
first formulated. The solemn protest of the United States, sup- 
ported as it was by the decisive stand of the English government,* 
did not pass unheeded by the continental European sovereigns. 
The contemplated intervention in the affairs of the Spanish colonies 
did not take place, and the year 1824 saw all the American 
dependencies of Spain freed from her oppressive yoke. Fifteen 
independent republics, embracing fifteen millions of her former 
subjects, arose on the ruins of her empire. 

682. End of Absolute Monarchy in Spain; the Republic of 
1 873-1874. — Spain was a corner of Europe which was not seri- 
ously agitated by the upheavals of the revolutionary year 1830. 
But there was here as elsewhere an increasing demand by the 
people for a share in the government. It was in recognition of 

4 The English government disapproved the plan of intervention, partly on account 
of its dislike of the principles of absolute government and partly on account of 
English trade interests in the Spanish-American countries. 



6l8 SPAIN AND HER AMERICAN COLONIES 

this growing democratic sentiment that in 1837 the nation was 
given a revised edition of the Constitution of 181 2. This date 
marks the end of absolute monarchy in Spain. 

The matter most worthy of notice in the internal history of Spain 
as a constitutional state is the establishment in -the peninsula of 
the short-lived Repubhc of 1873-1874. The leading spirit of this 
republican movement, and the third President of the common- 
wealth, was Emilio Castelar, a brilHant orator and a sincere patriot. 
But the people of Spain were not yet prepared for republican 
institutions. The republic lasted less than two years. Upon its 
downfall the monarchy was restored with a liberal constitution. 

683. Conclusion. — The century closed in gloom for Spain. 
In 1898 came the disastrous and humiliating war with the 
United States, respecting the causes and incidents of which the 
reader will turn to the later chapters of American history. It will 
be in place here simply to say that the war resulted in Spain's 
loss of Cuba and other insular possessions, — almost the last rem- 
nants of one of the most extended and magnificent of the colonial 
empires of modem times. 

Selections from the Sources.^ Hart and Channing, American His- 
tory Leaflets, No. 4, "Extracts from Official Declarations of the United 
States embodying the Monroe Doctrine." 

Secondary Works. — Hume, Modern Spain. Moses, The Establishment 
of Spanish Rule in America, chap, xi, " Spain's Economic Policy in America." 
WiNSOR, Narrative and Critical History of America, vol. viii, chaps, iv and v. 
Oilman, James Monroe, chap, vii, " The Monroe Doctrine " ; a valuable 
bibliography of Monroe and the Monroe Doctrine, by Professor J. F. 
Jameson, forms an appendix to the volume. Reddaway, The Monroe 
Doctrine. Edgington, The Monroe Doctrine. Hannay, Don Emilio 
Castelar. Latimer, Spain in the Nineteenth Century. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Monroe Doctrine. 2. Simon Bolivar. 
3. Emilio Castelar. 4. Don Carlos and the Carlists. 



CHAPTER XXXIX 
THE LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

684. Italy at the Downfall of Napoleon. — The Italian peoples, 
as being the most dangerously infected with the ideas of the Revo- 
lution, were, by the reactionary Congress of Vienna, condemned 
to the most strict and ignominious slavery. The former republics 
were not allowed to restore their ancient institutions, while the 
petty principalities were handed over in almost every case to the 
tyrants or to the heirs of the tyrants who had ruled them before 
the Revolution. 

Austria, as has been stated, appropriated Venetia and Lom- 
bardy, and from Northern Italy assumed to direct the affairs of 
the whole peninsula. " The baton of Metternich," wrote Mazzini, 
"governs and directs all the petty tyrants of Italy." Tuscany, 
Modena, Parma, and Lucca were given to princes of the House 
of Hapsburg. Naples was restored to its old Bourbon rulers. The 
Pope and Victor Emmanuel I, king of Sardinia (Piedmont), were 
the only native rulers, but they also were absolutists. 

The little republic of San Marino, whose very insignificance had 
protected it during the changes of the Revolution, was the only 
patch of free population left in the entire peninsula. The Italians 
had become a " Helot nation." Italy, in the words of Metternich, 
was merely a " geographical expression." 

But the Revolution had sown -the seeds of liberty, and time only 
was needed for their maturing. The Cisalpine, Ligurian, Parthe- 
nopean, and Tiberine republics, short-lived though they were, had 
awakened in the people an aspiration for self-government ; while 
Napoleon's kingdom of Italy, though equally delusive, had never- 
theless inspired thousands of Italian patriots with the sentiment 
of national unity. Thus the French Revolution, disappointing as 

619 



620 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

seemed its issue, really imparted to Italy her first impulse in the 
direction of freedom and national organization. 

685. Arbitrary Rule of the Restored Princes. — The setting up 
of the overturned thrones meant, of course, the reinstating of the 
old tyrannies. The restored despots came back with an implac- 
able hatred of everything French. The liberal constitutions of the 
revolutionary period were set aside, and all French institutions that 
were supposed to tend in the least to Liberalism were swept away. 

In Sardinia, King Victor Emmanuel I, the "royal Rip Van 
Winkle," instituted a most extreme reactionary policy. Nothing 
that bore the French stamp, nothing that had been set up by 
French hands, was allowed to remain. The monks were given 
back their monasteries, which had been converted into factories, 
colleges, and hospitals. The Jesuits were again placed in control 
of education. Even the French furniture in the royal palace at 
Turin was thrown out of the windows, and the French plants in 
the royal gardens were pulled up root and branch. Travel over 
the Mont Cenis road, constructed by Napoleon, was discouraged, 
in order that this monument of French genius might be forgotten. 

686. The Carbonari: Uprising of 1 820-1821. — The natural 
result of the arbitrary rule of the restored princes was deep and 
widespread discontent. An old secret organization, the members 
of which were known as the Carbonari (charcoal burners), formed 
the nucleus about which gathered the elements of disaffection. 

In 1820, incited by the revolution in Spain, the Carbonari 
raised an insurrection in Naples and forced King Ferdinand to 
grant his NeapoHtan subjects the Spanish Constitution of 181 2 
(sec. 678). But Prince Mettemich, who had been watching the 
doings of the Neapolitans, interfered to mar their plans. He 
reasoned that Lombardy and Venetia could be kept free from 
the contagion of Liberalism only by the stamping out of the infec- 
tion wherever else in Italy it might show itself. Sixty thousand 
Austrian .troops were sent ta crush the revolutionary movement, 
the Hberal constitution was suppressed, Ferdinand was reinstated 
in his former absolute authority, and everything was put back on 
the old footing. 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1830-1831 62 1 

Meanwhile a similar revolution was running its course in 
Piedmont, the aim of which was to secure a liberal constitution 
for Sardinia and to drive the Austrians out of Lombardy and 
join it to the Sardinian kingdom. King Victor Emmanuel I, 
rather than yield to the demands of his people for a constitution, 
gave up his crown and was succeeded by his brother Charles 
Felix, a despot by nature, who, by threatening to call to his aid 
the Austrian army, compelled his subjects to cease their clamor 
about kings ruling not by the grace of God but by the will of the 
people. 

The suppression of the Liberal uprisings seemed to Metternich 
the sure pledge of divine favor. He writes exultantly : " I see 
the dawn of a better day. . . . Heaven seems to will that the 
world should not be lost." 

687. The Revolution of 1830-1831. — For just ten years all 
Italy lay in sullen vassalage to Austria. Then the revolutionary 
years of 1 830-1 831 witnessed a repetition of the scenes of 1820- 
182 1. The revolution in France which placed Louis Philippe 
upon the French throne sent a tremor of excitement and hope 
through all Italy. The center of the revolution was the Papal 
States. The death of the Pope towards the close of the year 
1830 appeared to favor the undertaking. In a short time nearly 
all the territories of the Church were in open revolt, and a reso- 
lution of the insurrectionists declared that the temporal rule of 
the Pope was and by right ought to be forever ended. 

But the election of a new Pope, and the presence of Austrian 
troops, who, " true to their old principle of hurrying with their 
extinguishers to any spot in Italy where a crater opened," had 
poured into Central Italy, resulted in the speedy quenching of the 
flames of the insurrection. 

688. The Three Parties Twice now had Austrian armies 

defeated the aspirations of the Italians for national unity and 
freedom. Italian hatred of these foreign intermeddlers who were 
causing them to miss their destiny grew ever more intense, and 
"Death to the Germans ! " as the Austrians were called, became 
the watch cry that united all the peoples of the peninsula. 



622 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

But while united in their fierce hatred of the Aiistrians, the 
Italians were divided in their views respecting the best plan for 
national organization. One party wanted a confederation of the 
various states ; a second party wished to see Italy a constitutional 
monarchy with the king of Sardinia at its head ; while still a third, 
known as "Young Italy," wanted a republic. 

689. Joseph Mazzini, the Patriot and Prophet. — The leader 
of the third or republican party was the patriot Joseph Mazzini, 
who played so special a part in the movement for Italy's eman- 
cipation and regeneration that we must dwell for a moment upon 
his personality and work. 

Mazzini wished to see Italy freed from foreign domination and 
the populations of her different provinces united in a strong cen- 
tralized republic. The means of emancipation and regeneration 
were to be education and arms. 

Mazzini realized that there can be no real and successful Rev- 
olution without Renaissance. " Great ideas," he said, " must pre- 
cede great actions." Hence his aim was to create among the 
people a new intellectual and moraMife. "Tell the people," he 
said, " of the great past of Italy ; tell them of the advantages of 
liberty and independence; tell them what their brothers are 
doing in France, in Belgium, in Poland, in Hungary. Point to 
the Alps and cry, 'Those are Italy's true frontiers; out with 
the foreigner ! ' " 

Mazzini believed also in the use of bayonets, but only on con- 
dition that they have "ideas at their point." Insurrection was to 
be carried on at first by means of guerrilla bands ; then later with 
regular armies the people would overturn the thrones of the tyrants 
and set up the republic. 

But Mazzini was not a narrow nationalist. He recognized the 
universal character of the democratic revolution. The people 
were oppressed not only in Italy but in Spain, in Portugal, in 
Hungary, in Poland, in Russia, in Turkey, — almost everywhere, 
in truth. Their cause was a common cause. In opposition to 
the Holy Alliance of the princes formed with aim to oppress, 
there must be a Holy Alliance of the peoples formed with aim 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1848-1849 623 

to emancipate. The French Revolution, he said, had proclaimed 
the liberty, equality, and fraternity of individual men ; the new 
revolution should proclaim the liberty, equality, and fraternity 
of nations. 

In this great work of the emancipation and unification of the 
world, Italy was to be head and guide of the nations. To her 
this post of leadership was assigned by virtue of her leadership 
in the past. Italy had not yet consumed her life. She had still 
a third life to live. Once pagan Rome organized and ruled the 
world. Then papal Rome organized and ruled it for a thousand 
years. Now a third world union was to be formed, and of this 
union of the free and federated nations Italy, Italy as a republic, 
was to be center and head. The first Rome was the Rome of 
the Caesars ; the second was the Rome of the Popes ; the third 
was to be the Rome of the Italian People. 

Such was Mazzini's interpretation of the drama of world history. 
Such was his splendid ideal. Through kindling the enthusiasm 
of the ItaHan youth, awakening the sentiment of patriotism, and 
keeping alive the spirit of insurrection Mazzini rendered a great 
service to the cause of Italian liberation and union. 

690. The Revolution of 1848-1849. — After the suppression of 
the uprising of 1830 until .the approach of the memorable year 
1848, Italy lay restless under the heel of her oppressor. The 
republican movements throughout Europe which characterized 
that year of revolutions encouraged the Italian patriots in another 
attempt to achieve independence and nationaHty. Everywhere 
throughout the peninsula they rose against their despotic rulers 
and forced them to grant constitutions and institute reforms. 

The interest of the conflict centered in North Italy. The Sar- 
dinian throne at this time was held by Charles Albert, a true- 
hearted and zealous patriot, who had just granted his people a 
liberal constitution (1848), — a constitution which was to become 
the charter of the liberties of united Italy. Taking advantage of 
the embarrassment of the Austrian government caused by popular 
uprisings in all parts of its dominions, Charles Albert declared war 
against Austria, and straightway flung upon her forces in Lombardy 



624 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 



the Sardinian army, which had been augmented by volunteers 
from all parts of Italy. At first he was everywhere successful, and 
Lombardy and Venice both placed themselves under his rule ; but 
finally the veteran Austrian general Radetzky turned the tide of war 
against him, recovered Lombardy, and, invading Piedmont, inflicted 
upon the Sardinian army such a defeat (battle of Novara, 1849) 
that Charles Albert was constrained to resign his crown in favor 
of his son Victor Emmanuel II, who, he hoped, would be able to 

secure more advantageous terms from 
the victorious Austrians than he him- 
self could expect to obtain. 

Meanwhile the Romans had risen, 
proclaimed the Republic, and driven 
out the Pope, Pius IX. But the new 
Tiberine Republic was soon over- 
thrown by the troops of the French 
Republic, just recently set up (sec. 
653), and the Pope was reinstated in 
his authority. This interference by the 
French in Italian affairs was prompted 
by their jealousy of Austria and .the 
desire of. Louis Napoleon to win the 
good will of the Catholic clergy in 
France. Thus through the interven- 
tion of foreigners was the third Italian revolution brought to naught. 
691. Victor Emmanuel II, Count Cavour, and Garibaldi. — We 
have just noticed the accession to the Sardinian throne of Victor 
Emmanuel II as a constitutional ruler, — the only one remaining 
in Italy. Austria had tried to get him to repeal the constitution 
his father had granted, but he had resolutely refused to do so. 
To him it was that the hopes of the Italian patriots now turned. 
Nor were these hopes to be disappointed, Victor Emmanuel 
was the destined Hberator of Italy, or perhaps it would be more 
correct to say that his was the name in which the achievement 
was to be effected by the wise policy of his great minister Count 
Cavour and the reckless daring of the national hero Garibaldi* 




Fig. 10; 



Victor Emman- 



uel II. (From an engraving) 



SARDINIA IN THE CRIMEAN WAR 



625 



Count Cavour was the Bismarck of Italy, — one of those great 
men who during this formative period in the life of the European 
peoples have earned the title of Nation Makers. He was lacking 
in oratorical and poetic gifts. " I cannot make a sonnet," he said, 
"but I can make Italy," — an utterance suggested doubtless 
by that of the Athenian statesman (Themistocles) who boasted 
that though "he knew nothing of 
music and song, he did know bow of 
a mean city to make a great one." 
Cavour was the real maker of modern 
Italy. 

Garibaldi, "the hero of the red 
shirt," the knight-errant of Italian in- 
dependence, was a most remarkable 
character. Though yet barely past 
middle life, he had led a career singu- 
larly crowded with varied experiences 
and romantic adventures. Because of 
his violent republicanism he had 
already been twice exiled from Italy. 

692. Sardinia in the Crimean War. 
— In 1855, in pursuance of a far- 
sighted policy, Cavour sent a Sardinian contingent of fifteen 
thousand men to aid England and France against Russia in the 
Crimean War (sec. 722), with the two chief aims of giving Sardinia 
a standing among the powers of Europe, and of earning the grati- 
tude of England and France, so that the Italians in their future 
struggles with Austria might not have to fight their battles alone. 

A little incident in the trenches of the allies before Sevastopol 
shows in what spirit the Sardinians had gone to the war. A soldier, 
covered with mud and wearied with the everlasting digging, com- 
plained to his superior officer. " Never mind," was the consoling 
reply ; " it is with this mud that Italy is to be made." 

693. Cavour prepares for War with Austria After the Peace 

of Paris, which closed the Crimean War, Cavour continued the 
vigorous domestic policy which he had adopted for Sardinia with 




Fig. 103. — Count Cavour 
(From an engraving) 



626 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

the aim of developing her material resources and thus preparing 
her for great exertions. The most notable undertaking which he 
persuaded the Sardinian government to enter upon was the tun- 
neHng of the Alps beneath Mt. Cenis, in order that Sardinia might 
be brought into commercial intercourse with the north of Europe. 
" If we are to become great," he said, "we must do this. The 
Alps must come down." 

Another part of Cavour's policy was to cultivate the friendship 
of the French Emperor Napoleon III. In a secret meeting with 
the Emperor he received from him a promise that a French army- 
would, when the favorable moment arrived, aid the Sardinians in 
driving the Austrians out of Italy. In this proffer of help the 
French Emperor was actuated less by gratitude for the aid of the 
Sardinian contingent in the Crimean War than by a desire to les- 
sen the power of Austria in Italy and to replace it by French influ- 
ence, and to secure Savoy and Nice, which were to be France's 
reward for her intervention in Sardinia's behalf. 

694. The Austro-Sardinian War (1859-1860). — The hour for 
striking another blow for the freedom of Italy had now arrived. 
Sardinia began to arm. Austria, alarmed at these demonstrations, 
called upon Sardinia to disarm immediately upon threat of war. 
Cavour eagerly accepted the challenge. 

The French armies were now joined to those of Sardinia. The 
two great victories of Magenta and Solferino drove the Austrians 
out of Lombardy and behind the famous Quadrilateral, consisting 
of four strong fortresses, which sheltered Venetia. Just at this 
juncture the menacing attitude of Prussia and other German states, 
which were alarmed at the prospective aggrandizement of France, 
and the rapid spread of the revolutionary movement in Italy, which 
foreshadowed the union of all the states of the peninsula in a single 
kingdom, — something which Louis Napoleon did not wish to see 
consummated,^ — this new situation of things, in connection with 

1 Napoleon III did not wish for a united Italy any more than he wished for a 
united Germany. His aim was to create a kingdom in Northern Italy which would 
exclude Austria from the peninsula aiid then to bring about a confederation of all the 
Italian states under the presidency of the Pope. Italy thus reconstructed would, h*e 
conceived, be fain to look to the French Emperor as her champion and patriot. 



OUTCOME OF AUSTRO-SARDINIAN WAR 627 

other considerations, caused the French Emperor to draw back 
and to enter upon negotiations of peace with the Austrian Emperor 
Francis Joseph at Villafranca. 

The outcome was that Austria retained Venice but gave up to 
Sardinia the larger part of Lombardy. The Sardinians were bitterly- 
disappointed that they did not get Venetia, and loudly accused 
the French Emperor of having betrayed their cause, since at the 
outset he had promised them that he would free Italy from the 
"Alps to the Adriatic." 

But Sardinia found compensation for Venice in the accession 
of Tuscany, Modena, Parma, and the Romagna, the peoples of 
which states, having discarded their old rulers, besought Victor 
Emmanuel to permit them to unite themselves to his kingdom. 
Thus, as the result of the war, the king of Sardinia had added to 
lis subjects a population of seven millions. A long step Jiad been 
taken in the way of Italian unity and freedom. 

But while the Sardinian kingdom was thus vastly extended to 
the east and to the south, it was cut away a little on the west. 
Savoy and Nice, the former " the cradle of the Savoyard House," 
were given, according to previous agreement, as the price of her 
services, to France. 

695. Sicily and Naples, with Umbria and the Marches, added to 
Victor Emmanuel's Kingdom (i860). — The adventurous daring 
of the hero Garibaldi now added Sicily and Naples, and indirectly 
Umbria and the Marches, to the possessions of Victor Emmanuel, 
and changed the kingdom of Sardinia into the kingdom of Italy. 

These momentous events took place under the following cir- 
cumstances. In i860 the subjects of the Bourbon Francis II, 
king of the Two Sicilies, rose in revolt. Victor Emmanuel and 
his minister Cavour were in sympathy with the movement, yet 
dared not send the insurgents aid through fear that such action 
would arouse the jealousy of Austria and of France. But Gari- 
baldi, untrammeled by any such considerations and favored by 
the connivance of the Sardinian government, having gathered a 
band of a thousand volunteers, set sail from Genoa for Sicily, 
where upon landing he assumed the title of Dictator of Sicily for 



62S LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 



Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy, and quickly drove the troops of 
King Francis out of the island. Then crossing to the mainland 
he marched triumphantly to Naples, whose inhabitants hailed him 
tumultuously as their deliverer. 

But Garibaldi's rashness was creating a situation which threat- 
ened to bring about intervention by France and Austria, and 
perhaps by other powers. Count Cavour saw that the time had 

come for the Sardinian govern- 
ment to assume guidance of the 
revolutionary movement. The 
papal territories of Umbria and 
the Marches were accordingly 
occupied by a Sardinian army, 
which then marched southward 
and, by the capture after a long 
siege of the Neapolitan strong- 
hold of Gaeta, completed the 
work of the Garibaldian volun- 
teers. Meanwhile, a plebiscite, 
or popular vote, having been 
ordered, Umbria, the Marches, 
Naples, and Sicily voted almost 
unanimously for annexation to the Sardinian kingdom. 

Thus was another long step taken in the unification of Italy. 
Nine millions more of Italians had become the subjects of Victor 
Emmanuel. There was now wanting to the complete union of 
Italy only Venetia and Rome with the lands in the immediate 
neighborhood of the city, known as the "Patrimony of Saint 
Peter." 

696. Venetia added to the Kingdom (1866) — -The Seven 
Weeks' War (sec. 710), which broke out between Prussia and 
Austria in 1866, afforded the Italian patriots the opportunity for 
which they were watching to make Venetia a part of the kingdom 
of Italy. Victor Emmanuel formed an alliance with the king of 
Prussia, one of the conditions of which was that no peace should 
be made with Austria until she had surrendered Venetia to Italy. 




Fig. 104. — Garibaldi. 
an engraving) 



(From 



ROME BECOMES THE CAPITAL 629 

The issue of the war gave this territory to the kingdom of Italy. 
Rome and some Italian lands ^ on the northeastern frontier were 
all now lacking to complete the unification of the peninsula. 

697. Rome becomes the Capital (1870). — After the Hberation 
of Naples and Sicily the city of Turin, the old capital of the Sar- 
dinian kingdom, was made the capital of the new kingdom of 
Italy. In 1865 the seat of government was transferred to Flor- 
ence. But the Italians looked forward to the time when Rome, 
the ancient mistress of the peninsula and of the world, should be 
their capital. The power of the Pope, however, was upheld by 
the French, who maintained a garrison in the Papal States from 
1849 to 1870, and this made it impossible for the Itahans to 
have their will in this matter without a conflict with France. 

But events soon gave the coveted capital to the Italian govern- 
ment. In 1870 came the sharp, quick war between France and 
Prussia, and the French troops at Rome were hastily summoned 
home. Upon the overthrow of the French Empire and the 
establishment of the republic, Victor Emmanuel was informed 
that France would no longer sustain the papal power. The Italian 
government at once gave notice to the Pope that Rome would 
henceforth be considered a portion of the kingdom of Italy, and 
forthwith an Italian army entered the city, which by a vote of 
almost a hundred to one ^ resolved to cast in its lot with that of 
the Italian nation. 

The family was now complete. Italy was a nation — and the 
only great nation in Europe " made not by conquest but by con- 
sent." July 2, 1 87 1, Victor Emmanuel himself entered Rome 
and took up his official residence there. Since then the Eternal 
City has been the seat of the national government, — the capital 
of a free and united Italy.'* 

2 The Trentino and Trieste, It was chiefly to liberate these lands from Austrian 
domination that Italy entered the great war in 19 15 on the side of the nations fighting 
against the Central Powers (see Supplemental Chapter XLV, sec. 782). 

3 Exactly 133,681 to 1507. 

4 Victor Emmanuel II died in 1878, and his son came to the throne with the title 
of Humbert I. He was assassinated in 1900, and was succeeded by his only son, 
Victor Emmanuel III. 



630 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

698. End of the Temporal Power of the Papacy. — The occupa- 
tion of Rome by the ItaHan government marked the end of the 
temporal power of the Pope, and the end of an ecclesiastical 
state, the last in Europe, which from long before Charlemagne 
had held a place among the temporal powers of Europe, and 
during all that period had been a potent factor in the political 
affairs not only of Italy but of almost the whole continent. The 
papal troops, with the exc^eption of a few guardsmen, were dis- 
banded. The Vatican palace and some other buildings with their 
grounds were reserved to the Pope as a place of residence, to- 
gether with a yearly allowance of over six million dollars. By a 
statute known as the Law of the Papal Guarantees (1871), the 
Pope was secured in the free exercise of his spiritual functions. 

These arrangements have subsisted down to the present time. 
Under them the Pope is not to be regarded as a subject of the 
Italian government but rather as a sovereign residing at Rome. 
Like a sovereign he has the right to send and to receive embas- 
sies. His person is inviolable. No Italian officer may enter the 
Vatican or its grounds, which the Italian government respects the 
same as though they were foreign territory.^ 

699. The Vatican and the Quirinal : ^ the Roman Question. — 
The popes "^ have steadily refused to recognize the legitimacy of 
the act whereby they were deprived of the temporal government 
of Rome and the Papal States, and have protested against it by 
refraining from setting foot outside the gardens of the Vatican, 
by refusing to accept the annuity provided for them, and in 
various other ways. 

5 It is a matter worthy of note that just a few months before the loss of his tem- 
poral sovereignty a great ecumenical council of the Catholic Church (the Vatican 
Council of 1869-1870) had by a solemn vote proclaimed the doctrine of papal infalli- 
bility, which declares the decisions of the Pope, when speaking ex cathedra, " on 
questions of faith and morals," to be infallible. 

6 The Palace of the Quirinal at Rome contains the offices of the Italian govern- 
ment, and thus the term Quirinal typifies the secular as the term Vatican typifies 
the spiritual power in Italy. 

7 Pius IX died in 1878 and was followed in the pontificate by Leo XIII, who died 
July 20, 1903, at the patriarchal age of ninety-three, after having won a place among 
the greatest and the best of the popes. He was succeeded by Pius X, who died in 
1914, and who was followed by Benedict XV. 



THE VATICAN AND THE QUIRINAL 



631 



The partisans of the Papacy maintain that the act of dispos- 
session was an act of impious spoliation, and that there can be 
no settlement of the Roman Question save through the restora- 
tion of the Pope to his former status as an independent temporal 
sovereign. They contend that only through the possession of 
temporal power can the Pope be secure in his independence 
as the spiritual head 
of Catholic Chris- 
tendom. They de- 
mand, therefore, the 
retrocession to the 
holy see of at least 
the city of Rome, 
— maintaining that 
either Turin or 
Florence or Venice 
or Naples would 
serve as well as 
Rome for the seat 
of the Italian gov- 
ernment. 

To these censures 
and demands of 
the papal party the 
friends of the mon- 
archy reply that the 
extension of the 
authority of the 




Fig. 105. 



Pope Pius X. 
photograph) 



(From a 



Italian government over Rome and the papal territories was justi- 
fied by the modern principle of nationality, which recognizes in 
every people the right to choose their form of government and to 
shape their own destiny. As to the removal of the seat of the 
Italian government from Rome to some other city of the penin- 
sula, they maintain that the force of unique historical associations, 
and race traditions and memories, make Rome the logical and 
inevitable capital of a united Italy. 



632 LIBERATION AND UNIFICATION OF ITALY 

The long and heated controversy has had lamentable conse- 
quences for Italy. It has called into existence two bitterly 
hostile parties; it has hampered the Italian government in 
many of its policies of reform; and at different times it has 
even imperiled the very existence of the monarchy. 

700. Doubtful National Policies ; Reform and Progress. — Other 
things have concurred with the antagonism between the Vatican 
and the Quirinal to retard Italy's progress under the new regime. 
Among these hindrances may be reckoned an ill-advised colonial 
poHcy (sec. 738, n. 19) and an unfortunate yet natural ambition 
to play the role of a great European power, both of which have 
caused the government to neglect domestic concerns and to burden 
the country with the maintenance of an army and a navy altogether 
disproportioned to its needs and to its strength. 

Yet, notwithstanding these hindrances to national progress, 
very much has been accomplished since the winning of inde- 
pendence and nationality. Brigandage, an element of the bad 
heritage from the time of servitude, oppression, and disunion, 
has been in a great degree suppressed; railways have been 
built ; the Alps have been tunneled ; the healthfulness of the 
Campagna and other districts has been increased by extensive 
systems of drainage, and regions long given over to desolation 
have been made habitable and productive ; the dense ignorance 
and the deep moral degradation of the masses, particularly in 
the southern parts of the peninsula, — another element of the 
evil inheritance from the past, — have been in a measure over- 
come and relieved by a public system of education ; and Rome 
has been rebuilt, and from the position of a mean provincial town 
raised to a place among the great capitals of modern Europe. 

As to the progress made during the last thirty years in the 
development of the sentiment of nationality, upon the strength 
of which depends the peace, permanency, and prosperity of the 
new kingdom of Italy, a recent disaster furnishes a milestone by 
which to measure advance. In 1902 the great historic campanile 
which dominated St. Mark's in Venice (see Plate II), fell in a 
pathetic heap of ruins. Every city of the peninsula, says a 



•BIBLIOGRAPHY 633 

chronicler of the event, mourned just as if the tower had been 
its own, — "and then they opened a subscription." Had the 
catastrophe happened a single generation ago Venice would have 
had to restore her own bell tower ; but Italy is to-day a Nation, 
and the misfortune which befalls any Italian city afflicts all alike. 

Selections from the Sources. — Mazzini, Life and Writings. Should 
be read by all those whose souls, to use one of Mazzini's own phrases, need 
to be retempered in abhorrence of tyranny. Della Rocca, The Auto- 
biography of a Veteran, iSof-iSgj. A narrative of simplicity and charm. 

Secondary Works. — Probyn, Italy: from the Fall of N'apoleon I, in 
181S, to the Year i8go, and Stillman, The Union of Italy, iSi^-iEgj. 
The first of these affords the best short account for young readers ; the 
second is the best for a careful study. Martinengo Cesaresco, The 
Liberation of Italy, 181^-1870; also by the same writer, Cavour. Thayer, 
The Dawn of Italian Independence. Mazade, Life of Cavour. DiCEY, 
Victor Emmanuel. Yil^G, Mazzini. \-E^T\JRi, Joseph Mazzini. Gallenga, 
The Pope and the King; The War between Church and State in Italy. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The little republic of San Marino. 
2. Joseph Mazzini. 3. Count Cavour. 4. The Mont Cenis tunnel 
5. The Quirinal and the Vatican. 



CHAPTER XL 
THE MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

701. Formation of the German Confederation (181 5). — The 
creation of the new German Empire is the most important 
matter in the political history of Europe since Waterloo. The 
story of this great achievement affords a most instructive com- 
mentary upon the outworkings of the principles of the Revolu- 
tion, — the principles of popular sovereignty and nationality. It 
tells how nearly forty autocratically governed and practically 
sovereign states, German in speech and blood, which had been 
long separated by the policy of their divine-right rulers or by 
the circumstances of history, won constitutions embodying at least 
the rudiments of self-government, and were welded by force of 
arms and sentiment into a powerful state. 

This story begins with the Congress of Vienna.^ That body 
reorganized Germany as a Confederation, with the Emperor of 
Austria as President of the league. The union consisted of the 
Austrian Empire, and the four kingdoms of Prussia, Bavaria, 
Saxony, and Wiirtemberg, besides various principalities and free 
cities, — in all, thirty-nine states. A Diet formed of delegates 
from the several states, and sitting at Frankfort-on-the-Main, was 
to settle all questions of dispute arising between members of the 
Confederation, and to determine matters of general concern. In 
all matters concerning itself alone, each state was to retain its 
independence. It might carry on war with foreign states or enter 
into alliance with them, but it must do nothing to harm the Con- 
federation or any member of it. 

The articles of union, in a spirit of concession to the growing 
sentiment of the times, provided that all sects of Christians should 

1 For a word as to how Napoleon's reconstruction of the Germanic body laid the 
basis of German unity, see sec. 621. 

634 



DEFECTS OF THE CONFEDERATION 635 

enjoy equal toleration, and that every state should establish a 
representative form of government. 

702. Defects and Weaknesses of the Confederation. — The ties 
uniting the various states of this Confederation could hardly have 
been more lax. There was no central authority to enforce decrees, 
nor a written constitution to define its powers. One chief defect 
of the constitution of the league lurked in the provisions concern- 
ing the Federal Diet. The unwillingness of the several states to 
surrender any part of their sovereignty had led to the insertion of 
the rule that no measure of first importance should be adopted 
by the Diet save by a unanimous vote. The inevitable result of 
this provision was that no measure of first importance was ever 
passed by the assembly, which became throughout Europe a 
byword for hopeless inefficiency. 

Another defect in the federal government was that, because 
of the lack of centralized power, there existed no effective 
machinery for carrying out the acts of the Federal Diet. These 
amounted practically to nothing more than recommendations to 
the rulers of the several states, who paid no heed whatsoever to 
them unless they chanced to be in line with their own policies or 
inclinations. 

But what contributed more than all else to render the federal 
scheme wholly unworkable was the presence in the league of two 
powerful and mutually jealous states, Austria and Prussia, neither 
of which was willing that the other should have predominance in 
the affairs of the Confederation. 

Of these two rival states Prussia, though at first she yielded 
nominal precedence to Austria, which had a great past and enjoyed 
a vast prestige at the European courts, was in reality the stronger 
and the more promising state. Her strength lay particularly in the 
essentially unified character of her population. iVustria was inher- 
ently weak because of the mixed antagonistic elements in most of 
the territories that had been gradually united under the rule of 
the Hapsburgs. The greater part of their lands lay outside of the 
German Confederation and contained nearly twenty -five million 
Slavs, Magyars, Italians, and other non-German subjects. 



636 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

This difference in the character of the populations of Prussia 
and the Austrian Empire foreshadowed their divergent destinies, 
— foreshadowed that Austria should lose and that Prussia should 
gain the leadership in German affairs. 

703. The Dual Movement towards Freedom and Union ; Metter- 
nich and the Absolutist Reaction. — For a half century after the 
Congress of Vienna the history of Germany is the history of a 
dual movement, or perhaps it would be better to say two move- 
ments, one democratic and the other national in character. The 
aim of the first movement was the estabhshment of representative 
government in the different states of the Confederation ; the aim of 
the second was German unity. These movements were essentially 
the same as those which we have seen creating in the Italian pen- 
insula a free and united Italy. By what methods they were carried 
on and in what measure their aims v/ere attained will appear in the 
following pages. 

It was the democratic sentiment, the desire for free institu- 
tions, which first made itself felt. Several of the princes of the 
smaller states, in particular of those states along the Rhine which 
had been most directly under French influence, yielding to the 
popular demand, granted their subjects constitutions or created 
representative bodies of limited powers. 

Metternich, w^ho controlled the policies of the Austrian govern- 
ment, did not approve of the action of these liberal-minded rulers. 
He bade them remember that all the terrible trouble in France 
had begun with the assembling of the States-General, and solemnly 
adjured them not to commit such an unpardonable error as Louis 
XVI committed in allowing that body to come together. Several 
of the princes who had instituted representative government were 
frightened into withdrawing the constitutions they had granted 
and were persuaded to return to the safe and tried system of 
government by the sole will of the sovereign. 

704. The Revolutions of 1830 : Some Gains for Constitutional 
Government. — We have seen what were the consequences of the 
reactionary policy of the Bourbons in France and of the despots 
in Italy. Events ran exactly the same course in Germany. When 



FORMATION OF THE CUSTOMS UNION 637 

the news of the July Revolution in Paris spread beyond the 
Rhine, a sympathetic thrill shot through Germany, and in places 
the Liberal party made threatening demonstrations against their 
reactionary rulers. In several of the minor states constitutions 
were granted. 

Thus a little was gained for parliamentary government, though 
after the flutter of the revolutionary years the princes again took 
up their reactionary policy, and under the influence of Metter- 
nich did all in their power to check the popular movement and 
to keep governmental matters out of the hands of the people. 

705. Formation of the Customs Union ; First Step towards 
German Unity (1828-1836). ^It was just at this revolutionary 
epoch that the first step was taken in the formation of a real 
German nation. Under the Act of Confederation of 18 15 the 
members of the Germanic body were situated in respect to 
interstate trade almost as separate countries rather than as 
integral parts of the same country. It was the necessity of 
some general regulations in regard to commerce that impelled 
the American states to form a closer union ; it was the same 
necessity which now led the loosely confederated states of Ger- 
many to enter into an arrangement known as the Zollverein, or 
Customs Union. This was a sort of commercial treaty binding 
those states that became parties to it — by the year 1836 almost 
all the states of the Confederation save Austria had become mem- 
bers of the league — to adopt among themselves the policy of 
free trade ; that is, there were to be no duties levied on goods 
passing from one state of the Union to another belonging to it. 

The greatest good resulting from the Union was that it taught 
the people to think of a more perfect national union. And as 
Prussia was the promoter of the trade confederation, it accus- 
tomed the smaller states to look to her as their head and chief. 

706. The Uprisings of 1848 ; Further Gains for Constitutional 
Government. — The history of Germany from the uprising of 
1830 to that of 1848 may be summarized by saying that during 
all these years the people were steadily growing more and more 
earnest in their demands for liberal forms of government, while 



638 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

most of the princes, strangely blind to the spirit and tendency of 
the times, were stubbornly refusing all concessions that should 
take from them any of their power as absolute rulers. In some 
instances the constitutions already granted were annulled or 
their articles were disregarded. 

Finally, in 1848, news flew across the Rhine of the uprising in 
France against the reactionary government of Louis Philippe, and 
of the establishment by the French people of a new republic. 
The intelligence kindled a flame of excitement throughout Ger- 
many. The Liberals everywhere arose and demanded constitutional 
government. Almost all the princes of the minor states yielded to 
the popular clamor and straightway adopted the liberal measures 
and instituted the reforms demanded. In Austria and Prussia, 
however, the party of reform carried their point only after demon- 
strations that issued in bloodshed. 

Especially in Austria did affairs at this epoch assume a most 
threatening aspect.^ Metternich was obliged to flee the country. 
He went to England, whither Louis Philippe had just preceded 
him. The Emperor Ferdinand I abdicated in favor of his nephew 
Francis Joseph (Dec. 2, 1848), who granted the people a consti- 
tution and assented to the calling of a national assembly to be 
formed of representatives from all his hereditary dominions, 
chosen by popular vote.' 

At the Prussian capital Berlin there was serious fighting in the 
streets between the people and the soldiers, and the excitement 
was not quieted until the king, Frederick William IV, assured 
the people that their demands for constitutional government 
should be granted. In fulfillment of this promise the king granted 
a constitution and took an oath to rule in accord with its provi- 
sions (Feb. 6, 1850). Prussia thus joined the ranks of constitu- 
tional states. This state was now to play in the unification of 

2 The most serious trouble was in Hungary. Led by the distinguished statesman 
and orator Louis Kossuth, the Hungarians rose in revolt and declared their independ- 
ence of the Austrian crown (April 14, 1849). They made a noble fight for freedom, 
but were overpowered by the united Austrian and Russian armies. Kossuth escaped 
into Turkey. He died in exile at Turin in 1894. 

8 The Austrian constitution was withdrawn in 1851. 



BISMARCK, THE UNIFIER OF GERMANY 639 

Germany a part like that played by the constitutional state of 
Piedmont in the unification of Italy. Henceforth Prussian history 
is German history.* 

707. Bismarck, the Unifier of Germany In the year 1861 

Frederick William IV of Prussia died, and his brother, already an 
old man of sixty-three yet destined to be for almost a generation 
the central figure in the movement for German unity, came to the 
Prussian throne as William I. He soon called to his side Otto 
von Bismarck as Premier and Minister of Foreign Affairs. Bis- 
marck's appearance at the head of the Prussian government marks 
an epoch in history. " With that day," writes Sybel, speaking of 
Bismarck's accession to power, " a new era did in truth begin for 
Prussia and Germany and so for Europe." What the character of 
this era was to be, and what the result not only for Germany but 
for the world, of Bismarck's unscrupulous diplomacy and method 
of empire-building, the records of the decades before us will disclose. 

Bismarck contended that it was Prussia's mission to effect the 
unification of the German people. This work he was convinced 
could be accomplished only through the Prussian royal house. 
Hence he was a royalist, in truth almost an absolutist. Following 
this policy to its extreme limits, he developed the royal power in 
Prussia to an extremely dangerous degree. This unhampered 
absolutism he maintained would be the one instrument by means 
of which German unity could be created. This conviction deter- 
mined Bismarck's attitude towards the Prussian Parliament when 
it came in conflict with the royal power. He flouted it and 
trampled it under foot. He was known as the " Parliament 
tamer." Naturally he was distrusted and hated by the Liberals. 

Bismarck saw clearly enough how the vexed question between 
Austria and Prussia was to be settled, — "by blood and iron." 

4 About this same time the growing desire for German nationality expressed itself 
in an attempt to bind the German states in a closer union by means of a real national 
parliament to take the place of the inefficient Diet created by the Act of Confedera- 
tion in 181 5. To this end there met in Frankfort, May 18, 1848, a Constituent Assem- 
bly, the members of which had been elected in the different states by popular vote, 
which, like the Constituent Assembly of 1789 in France, was charged with the duty 
of framing a national constitution for the German states. Nothing was accomplished 
by the meeting. 



640 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

Austria's power and influence must be destroyed and she herself 
forcibly expelled from Germany before the German states could 
be remolded into a real national union. 

708. The Reform of the Prussian Army; Bismarck's Conflict 
with the Prussian Parliament. — It had been King William's 
policy to reform and strengthen the Prussian army. He had 
selected Bismarck as his prime minister because he knew he 
would carry out this policy in the face of the opposition of the 
Prussian House of Representatives. That body would not vote 
the necessary taxes. Bismarck held that it was their duty to 
make the necessary appropriations for the army, and when they 
persisted in withholding grants of money he, backed by his 
sovereign and the House of Lords, raised without parHamentary 
sanction what money he needed for his army reforms. 

It was a bold and dangerous procedure, and one that had 
been unsuccessfully attempted in other kingdoms under similar 
circumstances. Fortunately for King William and his imperious 
minister the policy proved highly successful in Germany, issu- 
ing in Prussia's predominance and in German unity; and the 
" Parliament tamer " and his master remained in power. 

709. The Schleswig-Holstein War (1864). — The weapon which 
Bismarck had forged w^as used in three wars. The first of these 
was the SchleswigrHolstein War. Holstein was a small duchy 
that had at various times been held as a part of Germany and 
of Denmark. In 1863, while it was regarded as a part of the 
latter kingdom, Frederick VII of Denmark died and the male 
line of the royal family became extinct. Germany now maintained 
that this duchy, and also Schleswig (for an old treaty was re- 
garded as having made the duchies inseparable), should become 
entirely free of the Danish crown, since Holstein did not acknowl- 
edge the right of female succession to the crown. The dispute 
soon ripened into war between Austria and Prussia and the new 
Danish king. Christian IX. Denmark was overpowered and forced 
to resign her claims to the duchies. 

Straightway the duchies became a bone of contention between 
Austria and Prussia. Bismarck was bent on annexing them to 



THE SEVEN WEEKS' WAR 64 1 

Prussia, since they would be a most valuable possession for her 
as a prospective sea power, giving her as they would the harbor 
of Kiel and control of a proposed canal uniting the Baltic and 
the North Sea.* Austria was determined that her rival should 
not get them unless she received valuable compensation in some 
form, — a bit of Silesia perhaps, or the promise of Prussia's 
help in case she had difficulty with her troublesome non-German 
provinces. 

There was endless controversy over the matter. Bismarck 
realized that Prussia could secure the coveted prize only through 
war with Austria, and to this extreme he was ready to go, since 
a war would settle not only the question respecting the owner- 
ship of the duchies but also the larger question as to Austrian 
or Prussian predominance in Germany. The hopelessly entangled 
Gordian knot was to be cut by the sword. 

710. The Austro-Prussian, or Seven Weeks', War (1866). — 
Both Austria and Prussia began to arm. Bismarck secured the 
neutrality of France by permitting the Emperor Napoleon to 
believe that if Prussia secured additional territory by the war, 
France would be allowed to appropriate Belgium or some Rhenish 
lands as a compensation. 

He also made a ready ally of Italy by engaging that in the 
event of a successful issue of the war the new Italian kingdom 
should in return for its alliance receive Venetia, which, it will be 
recalled, was at this time still lacking to complete the unification 
of Italy (sec. 695). 

Bids in the form of various proposals and promises were also 
made by Bismarck for the alliance of the smaller German states; 
but almost all ranged themselves on the side of Austria, so that, 
notwithstanding the advantage gained by the Italian alliance, it 
seemed like an unequal contest into which Prussia was venturing, 
since her population was not more than a third of that of the 
states which were likely to be arrayed against her. This disadvan- 
tage was more than offset, however, by the preparations for war 
made by Bismarck, who had long foreseen the struggle. 
*This canal was completed and opened in 1895. 



642 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

The war was carried on at once in three quarters, — in the 
South German states, in the Austrian territory of Bohemia, and 
in Italy. We need follow only the campaign in Bohemia. Here 
on the 3d of July, 1866, was fought the great battle of Sadowa, 
or Koniggratz, in which two hundred and twenty-two thousand 
Austrians were engaged with two hundred and twenty-one thou- 
sand Prussians. This was one of the great and decisive battles 
of history. It was Austria's Waterloo. The Prussians pushing on 
towards Vienna, the Emperor Francis Joseph was constrained to 
sue for peace, and on the 23d of August the Treaty of Prague 
was signed.^ 

The long debate between Austria and Prussia was over. By 
the terms of the treaty Austria consented to the dissolution 
of the old German Confederation and agreed to allow Prussia to 
reorganize the German states as she might wish. At the same 
time she surrendered Venetia to the Italian kingdom. The hin- 
drances she had so long placed in the way both of German and 
of Italian unity were now finally removed. 

711. Establishment of the North German Confederation (1867). 
— Now quickly followed the reorganization under the presidency 
of Prussia of the German states north of the Main into what was 
called the North German Confederation. There were twenty- 
one states in all, reckoning the three free cities of Hamburg, 
Bremen, and Liibeck. The domains of Prussia were enlarged by 
the annexation of Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, Nassau, the free city 
Frankfort, and the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. These 
annexations gave the Prussian king nearly five million new subjects 
and united into a fairly compact dominion his heretofore severed 
and scattered territories. 

A constitution was adopted which provided that all common 
concerns should be committed to a Federal Parliament or Diet, 
the members of the lower house of which were to be chosen by 



5 Since as the price of his consent to ItaUan unity the Emperor Napoleon had 
received Savoy and Nice (sec. 694), so now he hoped to obtain from Germany some 
Rhine lands as the price of his consent to German unity. This had caused the 
Prussian court to hasten the peace negotiations. 



THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR 643 

universal suffrage in the different states. The Prussian king was 
to be the hereditary executive of the Confederation, and the 
commander-in-chief of all the military forces of the several states. 

Thus was a long step taken towards German unity. Bismarck's 
purposely rough and brutal policy of " blood and iron " appeared 
at the time to benefit most of Germany's troubles. Though so 
much had been effected, there was still remaining much to be 
desired. The states to the south of the Main — Baden, Bavaria, 
Wiirtemberg, and Hesse-Darmstadt — were yet wanting to com- 
plete the unification of the Empire. 

What had kept these South German states from joining the 
new union was not only their reluctance to entering a confedera- 
tion dominated by Prussia but also the opposition of the French 
Emperor Napoleon III, who had insisted that the river Main 
should form the southern boundary of the Confederation of the 
North. He had thought that the South German states would form 
a union among themselves and look to him as their champion 
against Prussian aggression. 

712. The Franco-Prussian War (1870-187 1). — The Austro- 
Prussian War had laid the basis of a Franco-Prussian War. It 
has just been seen how German unity had come short of com- 
plete accomplishment partly through the interference of the Em- 
peror Napoleon. But it was intolerable to the German people, 
since the sentiment of German nationality was growing stronger, 
that France should be allowed to dictate to Germans respecting 
their internal affairs, and should stand between them and their 
national destiny. 

On the other hand, it seemed intolerable to the French that a 
strong German Empire should be allowed to arise right on the 
frontier of France, and that this new upstart power should shoulder 
France from her historic position as arbiter of Europe. All France's 
justifiable dislike of the House of Hapsburg was now transferred 
to the rising House of Hohenzollern. She watched with uneasi- 
ness the approaching consummation of German unity under 
Prussian leadership. Relations were so strained between the tWQ 
nations that war seemed unavoidable. 



644 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

It was not long in coming. In 1869 the throne of Spain became 
vacant. It was offered to Leopold, a member of the Hohenzollem 
family. The Emperor Napoleon III believed he saw in this a 
scheme on the part of the House of Hohenzollern to unite the 
interests of Prussia and Spain, just as Austria and Spain were 
united, with such disastrous consequences to the peace of Europe, 
under the princes of the House of Hapsburg. Even after Leo- 
pold, to avoid displeasing France, had declined the proffered 
crown, the Emperor Napoleon demanded of King William assur- 
ance that no member of the House of Hohenzollern should ever 
with his consent become a candidate for the Spanish throne. 

This demand was made of King William by the French ambas- 
sador Benedetti at the little watering place of Ems. But King 
William refused the demand and then sent a telegram to Bismarck, 
informing him of what had occurred, and at the same time giving 
him permission to make such use of the message as he saw fit. 
Bismarck unscrupulously edited the telegram in such a way as 
to convey the impression that the French ambassador had been 
brusquely dismissed by King William, and then gave it out for 
publication. War was now inevitable.^ 

713. The Proclamation of the New German Empire (187 1). — 
The astonishing successes of the German armies on French soil 
(sec. 654) had one far-reaching result upon the German people as 
a whole. All the obstacles which had hitherto prevented anything 
more than a partial union of the members of the Germanic body were 
now swept out of the way by an irresistible tide of national sentiment. 

While the siege of Paris was progressing, commissioners were 
sent by the southern states to Versailles, the headquarters of King 
William, to represent to him that they were ready and anxious to enter 
the North German Union. Thus in rapid succession Baden, Hesse, 
Wiirtemberg, and Bavaria were received into the Confederation, the 
name of which was now changed to that of the German Confederation. 



« Bismarck had made public Napoleon's request for Hesse and Rhenish Bavaria at 
the time of the Austro-Prussian War. These revelations had created a tremendous 
sentiment against France not only in the South German states but throughout all 
Germany. 



PROCLAMATION OF THE NEW EMPIRE 



645 



Scarcely was this accomplished when, upon the suggestion of 
the king of Bavaria, — who had been coached by Bismarck, — 
King William, who now bore the title of President of the Con- 
federation, was given the title of German Emperor, which honor 
was to be hereditary in his family. On the i8th of January, 187 1, 
within the Palace of Versailles, — the siege of Paris being still in 




Fig. 106. — An Incident of the Franco-Prussian War 

General Lapasset, seeing that capture was inevitable, burned the flags in his 
command to prevent them from falling into the hands of the Germans 



progress, — amidst indescribable enthusiasm the Imperial dignity 
was formally conferred upon King William, and Germany became 
a federal Empire. 

The Empire received a constitution. Though seemingly liberal, 
its articles were so adroitly drawn as to conceal the real absolutism 
of the government created. It provided for a pariiament or legis- 
lature comprising two bodies, a Federal Council (Bundesrat) and 
an Imperial Diet {Reichstag). The Federal Council, which formed 
the upper chamber of the legislature, was composed of sixty-one 
members, who were appointed by the princes of the federated states. 
Of the whole number of delegates the Emperor, as king of Prussia, 
appointed seventeen. The members of the Council voted as in- 
structed by the governments or rulers whom they represented. 



646 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

The Imperial Diet, which forms the lower chamber of the legis- 
lature, comprises about four hundred members elected by prac- 
tically universal manhood suffrage. The original apportionment 
was one member for every twenty thousand of the population of 
the federated states. 

We have here the forms of a constitutional parliamentary gov- 
ernment. These forms, however, as we have said, merely mask 
the practically absolute powders of the Emperor. As the one w^ho 
appoints and controls the vote of the seventeen Prussian members 
of the Federal Council (in addition to these he also controls the 
vote of the three delegates representing the imperial province 
of Alsace-Lorraine), he dominates that body. On all really vital 
matters it merely registers his will. 

As to the apparent powers of the Diet, there are provisions of 
the constitution which render these wholly illusory and leave to 
this body nothing more than the semblance of authority. It has, 
it is true, the right to originate bills, though as a matter of fact 
most bills, and particularly the important ones, are framed by the 
Federal Council ; but this right signifies very little, since the Fed- 
eral Council may veto any measure, and this veto can be overcome 
in no possible constitutional w^ay. 

Then, again, the Diet can be dissolved it any time by the Fed- 
eral Council, which means virtually by the Emperor. Whenever it 
refuses to act in accord with the imperial will, its members are 
sent home and a new election ordered, and by this means a new 
and usually more tractable body is secured. 

. Furthermore, the Diet has no part in shaping the policies of 
the government or any control over the administration of affairs. 
The Imperial Chancellor, who corresponds in his position in the 
government to the British Premier, is responsible not to the Diet 
but to the Emperor, who appoints and dism^isses him at will. He 
can disregard wdth impunity and treat with contempt a vote of 
lack of confidence by that body, so long as his master, the Emperor, 
supports him. 

Finally, the Diet has practically no control over matters of war 
and peace. The Emperor can declare a defensive war without the 



CESSION OF ALSACE AND LORRAINE 647 

advice or consent of this body, and since the Imperial Government 
does not scruple to falsify the truth and proclaim a purely offen- 
sive war as a defensive one, the Diet is without power or authority 
in this important domain/ 

These various provisions of the constitution leave to the Diet 
merely the shadow of power and authority, and make it, what it 
has been called, little more than an official debating club. Thus 
the constitution given the Empire by Bismarck, instead of creating 
a truly representative parliamentary government, created (or rather 
perpetuated) " an autocratic system of government adorned with 
a democratic fagade." 

714. The Cession to Germany of Alsace and Lorraine. — The es- 
sential provisions of the treaty between France and Germany have 
already been given (sec. 654). The cession to Germany of Alsace 
and Lorraine is the only matter connected with these momentous 
transactions upon which space will allow us here to comment anew. 

In insisting upon the surrender of these provinces, which were 
and which still remain passionately French in sympathy and senti- 
ment, although only partly French in blood, Bismarck has been 
severely censured, since this was a gross violation of the modem 
principle of nationality, the inhabitants of the ceded territories 
being allowed no voice in the question of their transference. 

715. Later Events. — For nearly twenty years after the close of 
the Franco-Prussian War the policy of the new Empire was 
directed by Bismarck as the first Imperial Chancellor. We can 
here indicate only two or three of the most noteworthy matters 
belonging to this period of the great Chancellor's rule. 

Special interest attaches to the so-called Kulturkampf^ which 
was a long, bitter struggle carried on by Bismarck with the 
Roman see. The papal party was hostile to the new German 
Empire because it gave predominance in Germany to Protestant 
Prussia. Very soon there was open conflict between the civil and 
the ecclesiastical authorities. Bismarck secured the passage of 

J" Thus the war of 19 14, though it was a war of criminal aggression on the part of 
Germany, was proclaimed by the Emperor as a war in defense of the Fatherland, 
and was started by him and his military advisers, the Reichstag not being ofRcially 
informed of the beginning of hostilities till four days later. 



648 MAKING OF THE NEW GERMAN EMPIRE 

laws, both by the Imperial and the Prussian Parliament, in restraint 
of the power of the Catholic clergy. The Pope declared the laws 
null and void. The fight grew in bitterness and recalled to mind 
the struggle between Pope Gregory VII and Emperor Henry IV. 
Bismarck declared, " We shall not go to Canossa." But he did 
go, at least part way, for in order to secure Catholic support for 
certain of his policies, he entered into a compromise with the 
Papacy, and the strife between State and Church was finally 
stilled (1887). 

In his foreign policy Bismarck's greatest achievement was the 
formation of what is known as the Triple Alliance {Dreibund) 
between the German Empire, Austria-Hungary, and Italy (1882). 
The chief objects of the Triple Alliance were to curb Russia's ambi- 
tion in the Balkans and to prevent a war between France and 
Gerinany. 

In 1888 Emperor William I died at the venerable age of ninety- 
one. He was followed by his son Frederick, who at the time of 
his accession was suffering from a fatal malady. He died after 
a short reign of three months, and his son came to the throne as 
Emperor William II (1888). 

It was generally thought that the young sovereign would be 
completely under the influence of Bismarck. But soon the 
Emperor disclosed a very imperious will of his own. His rela- 
tions with Bismarck became strained, and the aged Chancellor 
was brusquely dismissed (March 18, 1890). Many felt that the 
youthful Emperor had treated the creator of the Empire and the 
maker of the imperial fortunes of the House of Hohenzollern 
with gross ingratitude. On the other hand, the friends of the 
Emperor likened Bismarck to Wallenstein, and accused him of 
" aiming at something like sovereign sway in a province apper- 
taining to the Emperor."^ 



8 In his retirement at Friedrichsruh, an estate which was a gift to him from the 
grateful Emperor William I, Bismarck played the part of a " German Prometheus." 
He hurled defiance at all his enemies and did not scruple to subject the policies of 
the Emperor and his ministers to the most caustic criticism. The ex-Chancellor died 
in i8g8, being then in his eighty-fourth year. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY - 649 

The reign of William II after the dismissal of Bismarck was a 
very personal one. He would have made an ideal divine-right 
king in those halcyon days for autocratic rulers when there were 
no representative assemblies. 

The remarkable growth, in spite of the opposition of the 
Emperor, of the party known as the Social Democrats, who 
advocate an extreme programme of social and industrial reform, 
is one of the most noteworthy facts connected with the domestic 
history of the Empire.^ 

Selections from the Sources. — Translations and Reprints, vol. i, No. 3, 
for " The Act of Confederation " and other documents (ed. by James 
Harvey Robinson). Bismarck, the Man and the Statesman (being Reflec- 
tions and Reminiscences of Otto Prince von Bismarck, written and dictated 
by himself after his retirement from office ; ed. by A. J. Butler). Moltke, 
The Franco-German War, 1870-1871 (trans, by A. Forbes). 

Secondary Works. — Sybel, The Founding of the German Empire. 
Andrews, The Historical Development of Modern Europe, vol. i, chaps, vi, 
ix, and x ; and vol. ii, chaps, v and vi. Henderson, A Short History of 
Germany, vol. ii, chaps, viii-x. Lowe, Prince Bismarck. Headlam, 
Bismarck and the Founding of the German Empire. Lowe, The Germati 
Emperor William. II. BuscH, Our Chancellor. Lowell, Governments and 
Parties in Continental Europe, vol. i, chaps, v and vi ; and vol. ii, chap. vii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. The Carlsbad Decrees. 2. Louis Kos- 
suth and the Hungarian Revolt (1848). 3. Prince Bismarck as "Parliament 
tamer." 4. Prince Leopold and the Spanish crown. 5. The Kulturkampf 
6. The Triple Alliance. 

9 In 1871 this party cast a vote of about 124,000; in 1912 its vote reached the 
surprising figure of over 4,250,000, more than a third of the total vote cast. 



CHAPTER XLI 
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY AFTER 1866. 

716. The Reorganization of the Austrian Empire after Sadowa; 
the Compromise between Austria and Hungary. — The disaster of 
Sadowa did for Austria what the disaster of Jena did for Prussia, 
— it brought about its political and social regeneration. 

Chastened by the bitter humiliation and realizing that the 
maintenance of the old traditional system of absolute government 
was henceforth impossible, the Emperor Francis Joseph was now 
ready to make concessions to the national aspirations of the Mag- 
yars, and to yield to the growing demands of his subjects for 
liberal reforms and constitutional government. Soon after Sadowa 
he called to his aid the able Saxon statesman Count Beust and 
gave into his hands the task of reorganizing the shattered empire, 
just as after Jena King Frederick William of Prussia intrusted to 
Baron vom Stein the readjustment of Prussian affairs (sec. 640). 

The first step and the most important one in the process of 
reorganization was the recognition by the Austrian court of the 
claims of the Magyars to the right of equality in the monarchy 
with the hitherto dominant German race. By an agreement 
known as the Ausgleich^ or Compromise, the relations of Austria 
and Hungary in the reconstituted state were defined and regu- 
lated. It provided for the division of the old empire into two 
parts, now designated as the Austrian Empire and the Hungarian 
Kingdom.^ Each state was to have its own parliament, the one 
sitting at Vienna and the other at Budapest, and each was to have 
complete control of its own internal affairs. Neither was to 
have the least precedence over the other. 

The common interests of the two states, — those embracing for- 
eign affairs, the army, and finances, — were to be regulated by a 

1 The official designation of the dual state •sN3Sth& Anstro-Hujigaj-ian Monarchy. 

650 



DEPENDENT RACES IN THE MONARCHY 65 1 

third peculiar parliament, the so-called "Delegations," composed 
of sixty delegates from each of the other two parliaments. The 
hereditary head of the Austrian state was to be also the constitu- 
tional king of Hungary. 

This celebrated compact was duly ratified by the parliaments 
of Hungary and Austria, and the long struggle between the Mag- 
yars and the House of Hapsburg was at an end. The Hungarian 
constitution was restored and the same year (1867) the western half 
of the monarchy was also given a liberal constitution, and Austria- 
Hungary now definitely entered the ranks of constitutional states. 




Fig. 107. — The Parliament Building at Budapest 
(From a photograph by the author) 

717. The Dependent Races in the Monarchy ; Federalism versus 
Dualism. — The Compromise of 1867 thus reconstructed the old 
Austrian Empire as a dual monarchy, with the Germans as the 
ruling race in the western half of the state, and with the Magyars 
as the ruling race in the eastern half. It made no recognition 
whatsoever of the historic rights and liberties of the other races 
or nationalities of the monarchy, of which there were many. That 
is hardly a figure of speech which described the Austro-Hungarian 
Monarchy as a " European Tower of Babel." In the Austrian 
Parliament the oath was administered to the members in eight 
different languages. 

In the eastern half of the monarchy the Magyars, who formed 
only a minority of the population of the Hungarian kingdom, 



652 AUSTRIA-HUNGARY AFTER 1866 

but who, like the English, are a people of extraordinary energy 
and of great pride of race, were holding practically all the non- 
Magyar races ^ of the kingdom in just such political serfdom as 
they themselves were subjected to before their emancipation by 
the events of 1 866-1 867. 

It was the same in the other half of the monarchy. There a 
German minority^ held the Czechs in Bohemia and the Poles 
in Galicia in a state of subjection similar to that in which the 
Magyars held the non-Magyar races of Hungary. These depend- 
ent nationalities claimed that they had as good a right to self- 
government as had either the Germans or the Magyars. 

It was long evident that these contentions would end either in 
the disruption of the monarchy, or in the recognition by the two 
dominant races of the justice of the claims of these dependent 
peoples, and the conversion of the dual monarchy into a federal 
union composed of as many states as there were different nations 
or well-defined ethnic groups composing the population of the 
monarchy. During the life of the Emperor Francis Joseph the 
popularity of the sovereign with all the various races that com- 
posed his people was the only bond of union between them, but 
this insured the integrity of the monarchy. His popularity did not 
descend to his successor, Charles VIII, and the reverses suffered 
by Austpia-Hungary in the war of 19 14 brought about the dis- 
ruption of the monarchy in 19 18. 

718. The International Phase of Austro-Hungarian Questions. — 
The affairs of Austria-Hungary were almost as much a matter of 
European concern as were those of the Ottoman Empire. This is 
so for the reason that most of the ethnic groups within the mon- 
archy, with the exception of the Magyars, who constitute a com- 
pact and complete nation, were merely detached areas of larger 
bodies of kindred peoples in adjoining lands, and that there was a 
tendency in these small groups to gravitate towards the larger 



2 The census of 1910 gives the total number of inhabitants of Hungary as 20,886,487, 
of whom only 10,050,575 are returned as being of Hungarian race. 

3 The total population of Austria according to the census of 1910 was 28,571,934 ; 
the number of Germans (on basis of language), 9,950,266. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 653 

masses of their kindred in these neighboring countries. Thus the 
Austrian Germans were drawn towards the German Empire ; 
the Italians in Trieste and the Tyrol towards the Italian king- 
dom ; the Rumanians of Transylvania towards the principality of 
Rumania ; the Slavs of the South towards the Balkan Slav states, 
and the Slavs of the North, in times of special discontent, towards 
Russia. It is true, also, that these neighboring states have felt a 
reciprocal interest in the Austro-Hungarian lands of kindred race, 
and all have been deeply interested in anything that concerned the 
stability or lack of stability of the polyglot monarchy. 

Selections from the Sources. — Beust (Count von), Memoirs. Count 
Beust was not only the reorganizer of the Austrian Empire, but the 
inspirer of many of those HberaL reforms which after 1867 gave a new and 
modem aspect to the poHtical, social, and intellectual life of Austria. His 
Memoirs possess a deep interest for the student of the history of the 
transition from the Austria of Metternich to the Austria of to-day. 

Secondary Works. — Leger, A History of Austrp-Hungary, chaps, 
xxxv-xxxviii. LowELL, Governments and Parties in Continental Europey 
vol. ii, chaps, viii-x. Andrews, The Historical Development of Modem 
Europe, vol. ii, chaps, vii and xii. 

Topics for Class Reports. — At this point it would be well for the 
teacher to assign as subjects for special study the minor European states, 
any account of which the limitations of space have excluded from the 
text. In such assignments the following states should find a place : 
I. Greece. 2. The Balkan States. 3. Switzerland. 4. The Scandinavian 
countries. 5. Belgium. 6. The United Netherlands, 



CHAPTER XLII 
RUSSIA SINCE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

719. The Tsar Alexander I as a Liberal and as a Reactionist — 

During the earlier years of his reign the Tsar Alexander I (1801- 
1825) was a zealous advocate of certain liberal ideas. It was due 
largely to his influence that the French secured a constitution upon 
the restoration of the Bourbons. He introduced many beneficent 
reforms into Russia, and even encouraged his subjects to hope 
that they should have a constitution which would give them part 
in the government. 

But conspiracies among his own subjects and the popular upris- 
ings throughout Europe all tended to create in the Tsar a revul- 
sion of feeling. From an ardent apostle of liberal ideas he was 
transformed into a violent absolutist, and spent all his latter years 
in aiding the despotic rulers of Spain, Italy, and Germany to repress 
every movement among their subjects for political freedom. 

720. The Russo-Turkish War of 1828-1829 Alexander was 

succeeded by his brother Nicholas I (1825-1855), who, carrying 
out the later policy of his predecessor, strove to shut out from his 
empire every liberalizing influence of Western Europe. 

In 1828, taking advantage of the embarrassment of the Sul- 
tan through a stubborn insurrection in Greece,^ Nicholas declared 
war against the Ottoman Porte. The Russian troops crossed the 



1 This was the struggle known as the War of Greek Independence (1821-1829). 
This war was a phase of the liberal and national mo/ement which in the revolutionary 
year of 1821 agitated the Italian and Iberian peninsulas. Lord Byron devoted his 
life and fortune to the cause of Greek freedom. He died of fever at the siege of 
Missolonghi (1824). England, France, and Russia finally intervened. The Turko- 
Egyptian fleet was destroyed by the fleets of the allies in the bay of Navarino (1827). 
The year after this event began the Russian campaign in the Danubian provinces, as 
narrated in the text. 

654 



THE POLISH REVOLT 655 

Balkans without serious opposition, and were marching upon 
Constantinople when the Sultan sued for peace. The Treaty of 
Adrianople brought the war to a close (1829). 

Tsar Nicholas restored his conquests in Europe, but held some 
provinces in Asia which gave him control of the eastern shore of 
the Euxine. The Turkish provinces of Moldavia and Wallachia 
were rendered virtually independent of the Sultan. All Greece 
south of Thessaly and Epirus was liberated, and along with most 
of the islands of the ^Egean was formed into an independent 
kingdom under the joint guardianship of England, France, and 
Russia. Prince Otto of Bavaria accepted the crown, and became 
the first king of the little Hellenic state ^ (1832). 

721. The Polish Revolt (1830-1832). — In accordance with a 
mandate of the Congress of Vienna Poland was reestablished as 
a constitutional kingdom dependent upon Russia in some such way 
as Ireland was subject to England previous to the Union in 1801. 
But the rule of the Tsar over the Poles was tyrannical, and they 
were impatient of an opportunity to throw off the Russian yoke. 
The revolutionary movements of the year 1830 sent a wave of 
hope through Poland ; the people arose and drove out the Rus- 
sian garrisons. The armies of the Tsar, however, were quickly on 
the spot, and before the close of the year 1831 the Polish patriots 
were once more under the foot of their Russian master. 

It was a hard fate that awaited the unhappy nation. Their 
constitution was taken away and Poland was made a mere prov- 
ince of the Russian Empire (1832). Multitudes were banished 
to Siberia, while thousands more sought an asylum in England, 



2 In 1864 the little kingdom was enlarged through the cession to it of the Ionian 
Islands by England, in whose hands they had been since the Congress of Vienna. 
In 188 1 it received Thessaly and a part of Epirus by cession from Turkey, but in 
1897, as the result of an unfortunate war with the Sultan, was forced to accede to a 
treaty which gave back to the Ottoman Porte a strip of Northern Thessaly. Under 
the regime of freedom substantial progress took the place of stagnation and decay. 
Industry and commerce revived. The Isthmus of Corinth was pierced by a ship 
canal, which was opened for traffic in 1893. Railroads were built ; Athens took on 
the appearance of a modern capital. At the time of the outbreak of the war of 19 14 
its two universities had an attendance of more than three thousand students — a 
good omen for the future. 



656 RUSSIA SINCE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

America, and other countries. Of all the peoples that rose for 
freedom in 1830, none suffered so cruel and complete an extin- 
guishment of their hopes as did the patriot Poles.* 

722. The Crimean War (185 3-1 85 6). — A celebrated parable 
employed by the Tsar Nicholas in conversation with the English 
minister at St. Petersburg throws a good deal of light upon the 
circumstances that led to the Crimean War. "We have on our 
hands," said the Tsar, " a sick man — a very sick man ; it would be 
a great misfortune if he should give us the slip some of these days, 
especially if it happened before all the necessary arrangements 
were made." 

Nicholas had cultivated friendly relations with the English gov- 
ernment, and he now proposed that England and Russia should 
divide the estate of the " sick man," by which phrase Turkey of 
course was meant. England was to be allowed to take Egypt and 
Crete, while the Turkish provinces in Europe were to be taken 
under the protection of the Tsar, which meant of course the 
complete absorption, in due time, of all Southeastern Europe into 
the Russian Empire. 

A pretense for hastening the dissolution of the sick man was not 
long wanting. A quarrel between the Greek and Latin Christians 
at Jerusalem about the holy places was made the ground by 
Nicholas for demanding of the Sultan the admission and recogni- 
tion of a Russian protectorate over all Greek Christians in the 
Ottoman dominions. The demand was rejected, and Nicholas 
prepared for war. The Sultan appealed to the Western powers 
for help. England and France responded to the appeal, and later 
Sardinia joined her forces to theirs (sec. 692). 

England fought to prevent Russia from getting through the 
Bosporus to the Mediterranean and thus endangering her route 
to her Eastern possessions. The French Emperor acted under a 
variety of motives, — a friendly feeling towards England, a desire 
to avenge Moscow, and a wish to render his recently established 
imperial throne attractive to the French people by surrounding it 
with the glamour of successful war. 

« For Russia's part in the affairs of the revolutionary years 1848-49, see sec. 706, n. 2. 



EMANCIPATION OF THE RUSSIAN SERFS 657 

The main interest of the struggle centered about Sevastopol, in 
the Crimea, Russia's great naval and jnilitary depot in the Euxine. 
The siege of this place, which lasted eleven months, was one of the 
most memorable in history. The Russian general Todleben 
earned a great fame through his masterly defense of the works. 
The English " Light Brigade " earned immortality in its memor- 
able charge at Balaklava. The French troops, through their dash- 
ing bravery, brought great fame to the Emperor who had sent 
them to gather glory for his throne. 

The Russians were at length forced to evacuate their stronghold. 
The war was now soon brought to an end by the Treaty of Paris 
(March 30, 1856). The keynote of this treaty was the mainte- 
nance in its integrity of the Ottoman Empire as a barrier against 
Muscovite encroachments. Russia was given back Sevastopol, 
but was required to surrender some territory at the rnouth of the 
Danube ; to abandon all claims to a protectorate over any of the 
subjects of the Porte ; and to agree not to raise any more fortresses 
on the Euxine nor keep upon that sea any armed ships, save what 
might be needed for police service.^ 

72 3 . Emancipation of the Russian Serfs (1861). — The name of 
Tsar Alexander II (185 5-188 1) will live in history as the Emanci- 
pator of the forty-six millions of Russian serfs. In order to ren- 
der intelligible what emancipation meant for the serfs, a word is 
needed respecting the former land system in Russia and the per- 
sonal status of the serf. 

As to, the first, the estate of the lord was divided into two parts, 
the smaller of which was reserved by the proprietor for his own 
use, the larger being allotted to his serfs, who formed a village 
community known as the Mir.^ 

4 Russia repudiated this article of the treaty during the Franco-Prussian War in 
1871. She then restored the fortresses of Sevastopol, and before the opening of the 
war of 19 14 was maintaining a strong fleet of war ships on the Black Sea, 

5 This social and economic group affords the key to much of the history of the 
Russian people. It is the Russian counterpart of the village of serfs on the mediaeval 
manor of Western Europe. It is a cluster of a dozen or perhaps a hundred families, 
— a clan settled down to agricultural life. At the time of Peter the Great ninety- 
nine out of every hundred Russians were members of Afirs. To-day the ancient M ir 
has practically disappeared from Russia. 



658 RUSSIA SINCE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

Besides working the village lands, the fruits of which were 
enjoyed by the serfs, the villagers were obliged to till the lands 
of the lord, three days in a week being the usual service required. 
The serfs were personally subject to the lord to the extent that he 
might flog them in case of disobedience, but he could not sell them 
individually as slaves are sold ; yet when he sold his estate the 
whole community of serfs passed with it to the new proprietor. 

The Emancipation Code, " the Magna Carta of the Russian 
peasant," which was promulgated in 1861, required the masters 
of the peasant serfs to give them the lands they had farmed for 
themselves, for which, however, they were to make some fixed 
return in labor or rent.® The lands thus acquired became the 
common property of the village. All other serfs, such as house 
servants and operatives in factories, were to gain their freedom at 
the end of two years' additional service, during which time, how- 
ever, they were to receive fair wages. 

As in the case of the emancipation of the slaves in our South- 
ern States, the emancipation of the Russian serfs has not met all 
the hopeful expectations of the friends of the reform. One cause 
of the unsatisfactory outcome of the measure is that the villagers 
did not get enough land, save in those districts where the earth 
is very rich, to enable them to support themselves by its tillage. 
Hence many of them have fallen into debt and become the 
victims of heartless usurers. 

724. The Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878 ; the Treaty of 
Berlin ; the Dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire. — Anxiously 
as the Treaty of Paris had provided for the permanent settlement 
of the Eastern Question, barely twenty-two years had passed 
before it was again up before Europe, and Russia and Turkey 
were again in arms. The Sultan could not or would not give his 
Christian subjects that protection which he had solemnly prom- 
ised should be given. In 1875 the Greek Christian population of 

6 The serfs on the crown lands, about 23,000,000 in number, had akeady been 
freed by special edicts (the first issued in July, 1858). They were given at once, with- 
out any return being exacted, the lands they had so long tilled as noniinal bondsmen. 
We say nominal bondsmen, since this class labored under only a few restrictions and 
were subject to the payment merely of a light rent. 



THE TREATY OF BERLIN 659 

Herzegovina and Bosnia, European provinces of the Ottoman 
Empire, goaded to desperation by the oppression of Turkish tax- 
gatherers, rose in revolt. Then the Bulgarians also rose. The 
Turkish measures of repression resulted in what are known as the 
" Bulgarian atrocities," — massacres of Christian men, women, 
and children more revolting perhaps than any others of which 
history had told. 

Fierce indignation was kindled throughout Europe. Servia and 
Montenegro declared war. The Russian armies were set in mo- 
tion. Kars in Asia Minor and Plevna in European Turkey, the 
latter after a memorable siege, fell into the hands of the Russians, 
and the armies of the Tsar were once more in full march upon 
Constantinople, with the prospect of soon ending forever Turkish 
rule on European soil, when England, to retain the balance of 
power in Europe, intervened, sent her fleet through the Darda- 
nelles, and arrested the triumphant march of the Russians. 

The Treaty of Berlin' (1878) adjusted once more the disor- 
ganized affairs of the Sublime Porte and bolstered up as well as 

7 In this treaty the great powers revised the Treaty of San Stefano which Russia 
had concluded with Turkey, and which practically expelled the Ottoman Porte from 
Europe. " [It is] ' an essential principle of the law of nations that no Power can 
repudiate treaty engagements or modify treaty provisions, except with the consent 
of the contracting parties by mutual agreement,' ... It was in virtue of this prin- 
ciple that Russia was obHged to submit the Russo-Turkish Treaty of San Stefano, 
and with it the fruits of her victories . . ., to the arbitrament of the Congress of 
Berlin. At that Congress Bismarck played his favorite role of ' honest broker,' and 
there is considerable ground for believing that he sold the same stock several times 
over to different clients and pocketed the 'differences.' What kind of conflicting 
assurances he gave to the different Powers will never be fully known, but there is 
good ground for believing that in securing the temporary occupation of Bosnia- 
Herzegovina he had in mind the ultimate Germanization of the Adriatic, and that 
domination of the Mediterranean at the expense of England which has long been 
the dream of German publicists from Treitschke onAvard. What, however, clearly 
emerged from the Congress, and was embodied in Article XXV of the Berlin Treaty, 
was, that Austria was to occupy and administer Bosnia-Herzegovina under a Euro- 
pean mandate. She acquired lordship without ownership ; in other words, the terri- 
tory became a Protectorate. Her title, as it originated in, so it was limited by, the 
Treaty of Berlin. Exactly thirty years later, in the autumn of 1908, Austria, acting 
m concert with Germany, abused her fiduciary position and without any mandate 
from the Powers annexed the territory of which she had been made the guardian. 
This arbitrary action was a violation of the principle to which she and Germany had 
subscribed at the London Conference, and Sir Edward Grey [at the time of this 



66o RUSSIA SINCE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

was possible the " sick man." But he lost a good part of his 
estate, for even his friends had no longer any hope either of 
his recovery or of his reformation. Out of those provinces of his 
dominions in Europe in which the Christian population was most 
numerous, there was created a group of wholly independent or 
half -independent states.^ The northern frontier of the Ottoman 
Empire in Europe was thus pushed back to the Balkans. Bosnia 
and Herzegovina were given to Austria-Hungary to administer, but 
were not actually severed from the Ottoman Empire until they 
w^ere annexed by Austria in 1908. 

The island of Cyprus, by a secret arrangement between the 
Ottoman Porte and the English government, was ceded to Eng- 
land "to be occupied and administered." In return England 
guaranteed the integrity of the Sultan's possessions in Asia. 

Russia acquired some places in Armenia, which gave her fuller 
control of the eastern shores of the Euxine, and also received 
Bessarabia on the Lower Danube, which territory she had been 
forced to give up at the close of the Crimean War. In a word, 
Russia regained everything she had lost in that struggle, while 
Turkey was shorn of half her European possessions. There were 
left in Europe under the direct authority of the Sultan barely five 
million subjects, about one half of these being Christians.* 

action] attempted, as Lord Granville had done before him, to preserve the credit of 
the public law of Europe by a conference which should consider the compensation 
due to Servia for an act which so gravely compromised her security." — The War 
Book of the German Staff (Introduction by J. H. Morgan), p. 23. 

8 The absolute independence of Rumania (the ancient provinces of Moldavia and 
Wallachia), Servia, and Montenegro was formally acknowledged; Bulgaria, north 
of the Balkans, was to enjoy self-government, but was to pay.tribute to the Porte ; 
Eastern Rumelia was to have a Christian governor, but was to remain under the 
dominion of the Sultan. In 1885 Eastern Rumelia united with Bulgaria. 

9 The career of the little states carved out of the lands liberated from the Ottoman 
yoke has been most turbulent. But this is not strange, since the long subjection of 
these regions to the barbarous rule of the Turk has prevented their sharing in the 
general progress of Europe and has left their peoples in the mediaeval stage of 
civilization, — a fact startlingly emphasized by the assassination in 1903 of the king 
and queen of Servia, the account of which crime reads like a displaced chapter from 
the history of the Middle Ages. The situation of things here in the Balkans con- 
tributed largely to the bringing on of the World War (see Supplemental Chapter, 
sees. 771, 773, 775). 



NIHILISM AND TERRORISM 66l 

725. The Liberal Movement in Russia ; Nihilism and Terrorism. 

— We must now note a movement in Russian society more sig- 
nificant for Russian history and thus for general history than any 
of the wars of the Tsars or the diplomacy of the Muscovite court. 
This is the intellectual revolt of the educated Russian classes 
against the autocratic and repressive government of the Tsar. 

This Liberal movement is nothing else than the outworking in 
Russia of the ideas of the French Revolution. " In regard to the 
future consequences of this singular revolution," writes that keen 
observer, Arthur Young, "as an example to other nations, there 
can be no doubt but the spirit which has produced it will, sooner 
or later, spread throughout Europe, according to the different 
degrees of enlightenment amongst the common people." With- 
out doubt the deepest cause of the Liberal movement which has 
agitated Russia for more than a century must be sought in the 
awakening intelligence of the Russian nation. 

But if some definite beginning of the movement be sought, this 
may be found in the events of 18 13-18 15. In those years, as it 
has been put, the whole Russian army, like the great Tsar Peter, 
went on a pilgrimage to the West, and, like Peter, they got some 
new ideas. This was simply a repetition of what had occurred 
in the case of those Frenchmen who in 1776 went to America 
to take part in the War of American Independence (sec. 560). 

Those carrying on this propaganda of Liberalism are known as 
Nihilists. They are found especially in the faculties and among 
the students of the universities. Their fundamental demands are 
for constitutional representative government, the reform of the 
judicial system, and the removal of the restriction upon free dis- 
cussion of public matters. In a word, they demand that the Russian 
people shall enjoy all those rights and immunities which the 
peoples of Western Europe have secured and are now enjoying. 

This revolutionary propaganda was hindered and thwarted by 
the stolid ignorance of the Russian peasantry, who gave to the Tsar 
a blind devotion, and regarded his person and his office with a 
superstitious veneration. In the face of this inertness and blindness 
of the Russian masses, the leaders of the revolt are helpless, — all 



662 RUSSIA SINCE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 

of which affords a fresh illustration of the truth that Revolution 
is impossible without Renaissance and Reformation. Russia, as 
regards the common people, has had neither. The true Political 
Revolution awaits the intellectual revival and the moral reform. 

At the time of the Russo-Turkish War of 1 878-1879 the 
Liberal movement assumed a violent phase, — just as the Revolu- 
tion in France did in 1793, — being then transformed into what 
is known as Terrorism. Nihilism took this form under the perse- 
cutions and repressions of the government. The principle of the 
extreme Nihilists, or Terrorists, that assassination is a righteous 
means of political reform was now acted upon. March 13, 1881, 
the Tsar Alexander was assassinated. After that event the 
government under Alexander III (1881-1894) was even more 
repressive than before ; and for the first ten years of his reign, 
Nicholas II (1894-19 17) followed the policies of his father. 

There could be but one outcome to this contest between the 
" Autocrat of all the Russias " ^° and his subjects. Either through 
wise concessions on the part of its rulers, or through the throes of 
a terrible revolution like that of 1789 in France, the Russian 
Empire was bound sooner or later to become a free self-governing 
state. The Tsars of Russia were simply fighting the hopeless 
battle that has been fought and lost by the despotic sovereigns of 
every other European country, a battle which has always the same 
issue, — the triumph of Liberal principles and the admission of 
the people to a participation in the government. 

726. The Russianizing of Finland. — Like all autocrats the 
Tsars aimed at the establishment of uniformity throughout 
their empire. Their maxim was, " One faith, one king, one 
law." The dealings of Tsar Nicholas with Finland will illus- 
trate how all the non-Russian races of the empire were made 
the victims of the policy of the Tsars to Russianize their 

10 It is only theoretically of course that the Tsar was the autocratic ruler of Russia. 
The power behind the throne, the actual ruler, was the hierarchy of officials, who con- 
stituted what is known as a bureaucracy. This body of narrow-minded, selfish, and 
corrupt officials has been well likened to the monster in Mrs. Shelley's romance 
Frankenstein. Like that monster it got beyond the control of its creator and com- 
mitted wanton and revolting crimes. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 663 

dominions. Finland was ceded to Russia by Sweden in 1809 and 
formed a grand duchy of the Russian Empire. It had a liberal 
constitution which the Tsars swore to maintain and which secured 
the Finns a full measure of local self-government. Under their 
constitution the Finns, who number about two million souls, were 
a loyal, contented, and prosperous people. During his reign the 
Tsar Nicholas by a series of imperial decrees practically annulled 
the ancient Finnish constitution and reduced the country to the 
condition of an administrative district of the empire. 

The Duma. — The disastrous results of the Russo-Japanese War 
(see pages 693-695) imparted a great impetus to the Liberal move- 
ment in Russia. Popular discontent increased until, in August, 1905, 
an emphatic demand was made for a representative assembly. The 
Tsar was forced to yield, and in October issued a manifesto author- 
izing the calling of an assembly, or Duma. The first Duma was in 
session by May 10, 1906, spoke boldly for reform, and attempted 
some constructive legislation ; but its activities were hindered by 
the Tsar and the Council of the Empire. It was dissolved in July 
and a second Duma summoned. This second body was in session 
from March 5 to June 16, 1907, but it too was dissolved after an 
effort to control its actions by the arbitrary, arrest of progressive 
leaders. In November of this same year a third Duma assembled. 
Its membership was composed largely of reactionaries elected by 
the privileged classes ; in no sense was it a body representative of 
the people. It proved to be obedient to the autocratic rule and 
destroyed what little confidence was left in the promises of the 
Tsar for reform and constitutional government. The term of the 
third Duma having expired, a fourth was electled in November, 
1912, which proved even more conservative than the third assembly. 
This body passed out of existence when prorogued by the govern- 
ment in September, 19 15. 

Secondary Works. — Rambaud, History of Russia, vol. iii. Leroy- 
Beaulieu, The Empire of the Tsars and the Russians. KiNGLAKE, The 
Invasion of the Crimea. MORFILL, The Story of Russia, chaps, x and xi. 
Wallace, Russia. Stepniak, The Russian Peasantry. Noble, The Rtis- 
sian Revolt and Russia and the Russians. 



CHAPTER XLIII 
EUROPEAN EXPANSION IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 

I. Causes and General Phases of the Expansion 
Movement 

727. Significance of the Expansion of Europe into Greater 
Europe. — In speaking of the establishment of the European 
colonies and settlements of the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
turies we likened this expansion of Europe into Greater Europe 
to the expansion in antiquity of Greece into Greater Greece 
and Rome into Greater Rome (sec. 310). We have now to say 
something of the later phases of this wonderful outward move- 
ment of the European peoples. 

In the first place we should note that it is this expansion 
movement which gives such significance to that intellectual, 
moral, and pohtical development of the European peoples which 
we have been studying. This evolution might well be likened to 
the rehgious evolution in ancient Judea. That development of a 
new religion was a matter of transcendent importance because 
the new faith was destined not for a little corner of the earth 
but for all the world. Likewise the creation by Renaissance, 
Reformation, and Revolution of a new, rich, and progressive 
civilization in Europe is a matter of vast importance to universal 
history because that civiHzation has manifestly been wrought out 
not for a single continent or for a single race but for all the 
continents and for all mankind. 

We are now to see how the bearers of this new culture have 
carried or are carrying it to all lands and are communicating 
it to all peoples, thereby opening up a new era not alone in the 
history of Europe but in the history of the world. 

664 



THE EARLIER COLONIAL EMPIRES 665 

728. The Fate of the Earlier Colonial Empires; Decline and 
Revival of Interest in Colonies. — The history we have narrated 
has revealed the fate of all the colonial empires founded by the 
various European nations during the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries. The magnificent Portuguese Empire soon became the 
spoil of the Dutch and the English; France lost her colonial 
possessions- to England ; a great part of the colonies of the Dutch 
also finally fell into English hands ; before the end of the eight- 
eenth century England lost through revolution her thirteen col- 
onies in North America ; and in the early part of the nineteenth 
century Spain in like manner lost all her dependencies on the 
mainland of the New World.^ 

After these discouraging experiences with their colonies the 
governments of Europe lost interest for a while in possessions 
beyond the seas. Statesmen came to hold the doctrine that 
colonies are "like fruit, which as soon as ripe falls from the 
tree." The English minister Disraeli, in referring to England's 
colonial possessions, once used these words.: "Those wretched 
colonies are millstones about our neck." 

Before the close of the nineteenth century, however, there 
sprang up a most extraordinary revival of interest in colonies 
and dependencies, and the leading European states began to 
compete eagerly for over-the-sea possessions. 

729. Causes of the Revived Interest in Colonies. — A variety 
of causes concurred to awaken or to foster this new interest in 
colonies. One cause is to be found in the rapid increase during 
the nineteenth century of the people of European stock. At the 
beginning of the century the estimated population of Europe 
(excluding Turkey) was about one hundred and sixty millions; 
at the end of the century it had risen to four hundred and thirty- 
six millions. During this same period the number of people of 
European stock in the world at large rose from about one 



1 For notices of the rise and decline of the Portuguese Empire, see sees. 304, 306, 
307 n. 5, 355, and 679 n. 2 ; of the Dutch, sees. 355, 492, and 736 n. 14; of the French, 
sees. 424, 452, 540, and 611 ; of the English, sees. 363, 392, 461, 540, and 541 ; and of 
the Spanish, sees. 311-313, 680, and 681. 



666 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

hundred and seventy millions to over five hundred millions.* This 
increase in numbers of the European peoples is one of the most 
important facts in modern history. It has caused Europe to 
overflow and to inundate the world. It has made the smallest 
of the continents the mother and nursery of nations.^ 

The pohtical significance of this great outward movement, 
which almost unnoticed for a long time by European statesmen 
was creating a new Europe outside of Europe and shifting the 
center of gravity of the world, at last attracted the attention of the 
European governments and awakened an unwonted interest in 
colonies and dependencies. 

A second cause is to be found in the industrial revolution 
which began in England towards the end of the eighteenth 
century (sec. 544) and which gradually transformed the indus- 
trial life of all the more advanced nations. The enormous quan- 
tity of fabrics and wares of every kind which the new processes 
of manufacture created, led to sharp competition among com- 
mercial classes in the different nations for the control of the 
markets in the uncivilized or semi-civilized lands. In order to 
secure a monopoly of these markets for their subjects it was 
thought necessary by the European governments to take pos- 
session of these lands or to estabhsh protectorates over them. 

A third cause, one which tended to give a general character 
to the colonial movement, was the manifest advantage that Eng- 
land was deriving from her colonial possessions, especially as 
revealed on the occasions of Queen Victoria's Golden and Dia- 
mond Jubilees in 1887 and 1897, when there passed along the 
streets of London imposing processions of representatives of all 

2 These earlier numbers must be regarded as mere approximations. We have 
no reliable figures for the beginning of the century. Census-taking is practically a 
nineteenth-century innovation, save in two or three countries. 

3 The great tide of emigration which during the past century has flowed from 
Europe into the unoccupied places of the world was not set in motion by any single 
cause. With the pressure arising from the growing population of Europe, which may 
be regarded as the primary cause of the movement, there concurred a great variety of 
other causes, political, religious, and economic in their nature, such as have always 
been inciting or fostering causes in every great migration and colonization movsment 
known to history. 



STANLEY'S DISCOVERIES 



667 



the races of the British Empire. This spectacle, unparalleled in 
modern times in its suggestions of imperial riches and power, 
produced a profound impression upon the witnessing nations. 
It stirred in them a spirit of emulation and made them eager 
to secure colonial possessions and dependencies that they too 
like England might rule over many lands and races. 

Thus it came about through these and other influences that 
during the last fifteen or twenty years of the nineteenth century 
almost all the old colonizing peoples of Europe were exerting 
themselves to the utmost to build up new empires to take the 
place of those they had lost, while 
other nations that had never pos- 
sessed colonies now also began to 
compete eagerly with those earlier 
in the field for over-the-sea posses- 
sions. 

730. Stanley* s Discoveries open 
up the "Dark Continent." — By the 
time, however, of this awakening of 
the governments of Europe to the 
importance of colonies almost all the 
lands outside of Europe suited to 
European settlement were closed 
against true colonizing enterprises by 
having been appropriated by Eng- 
land, or through their being in the control of independent states 
that had grown out of colonies planted by immigrants of European 
speech and blood. The makers of new empires had no longer the 
whole world before them from which to choose. 

Africa, however, was still left. For a century intrepid explorers 
had been endeavoring to uncover the mysteries of that continent. 
Among these was the missionary-explorer David Livingstone. 
He died in 1873. His mantle fell upon Henry M. Stanley, who 
a short time after the death of Livingstone set out on an adven- 
turous expedition across Africa^ (i 874-1877), in which journey 

* Stanley had made an earlier expedition (1871-1872) in search of Livingstone. 




Fig. 108. — Henry M. Stan- 
ley. (From a photograph) 



66d> EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

he discovered the course of the Congo and learned the nature 
of its great basin. Not since the age of Columbus had there been 
any discoveries in the domain of geography comparable in impor- 
tance to these of Stanley. Stanley gave the world an account of 
his journey in a book bearing the title Through the Dark Conti- 
nent. The appearance of this work marks an epoch in the history 
of Africa. It inspired innumerable enterprises, political, commer- 
cial, and philanthropic, whose aim was to develop the natural 
resources of the continent and to open it up to civilization. 

731. The Founding of the Congo Free State (1885). — One 
immediate outcome of the writings and discoveries of Stanley 
was the founding of the Congo Free State. 

King Leopold II of Belgium was one of those whose imagina- 
tion was touched by the vast possibilities of the African continent. 
He conceived the idea of establishing in the valley of the Congo 
a great state which should be a radiating center for the diffusion 
of the benefits of civilization over the Dark Continent. Through 
his efforts an International African Association was formed, under 
whose auspices Stanley, after his return from his second expedi- 
tion, was sent out to establish stations in the Congo basin and to 
lay there the foundation of European order and government. 

The Association had found in Stanley a remarkably able lieu- 
tenant. His work as an organizer and administrator was carried 
on almost continuously for five years (1879-1884), "long years 
of bitter labor," as he himself speaks of them. He made treaties 
with over four hundred and fifty native chiefs, who ceded to him 
their sovereign rights over their lands. He founded numerous 
stations along the banks of the Congo and its tributaries. By 
these and like herculean labors Stanley — Stanley Africanus, it 
has been suggested, should be his ennobled name — became the 
real founder of what is now known as the Congo Free State and 
earned a place among the great administrators and state builders 
of modern times. ^ 

5 From 1882, the year of the actual founding of the state, until 1908 the country 
was merely an appanage of the Belgian crown. In 1908 Leopold II (Belgian king) 
ceded the state to Belgium. Important products of the country are rubber, palm- 
nuts, and cocoa. Cotton and tobacco are successfully cultivated. Recent estimates 



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THE EXPANSION OF ENGLAND 669 

732. The Partition of Africa. — The discoveries of Stanley and 
the founding of the Congo Free State were the signal for a scram- 
ble among the powers of Europe for African territory. England, 
France, and Germany were the strongest competitors and they 
got the largest shares. In the short space of fifteen years Africa 
became a dependency of Europe. The only native states retaining 
their independence by the end of the nineteenth century were 
Abyssinia and Morocco,^ together with the negro republic of 
Liberia, the government of which is in the hands of American 
freedmen or their descendants. - 

This transference of the control of the affairs of Africa from 
the hands of its native inhabitants or those of Asiatic Moham- 
medan intruders to the hands of Europeans is without question 
the most momentous transaction in the history of that continent, 
and one which must shape its future destiny. 

In the following sections of this chapter, in which we propose 
briefly to rehearse the part which each of the leading European 
states has taken in the general expansion movement, we shall 
necessarily have to speak of the part which each played in the 
partition of Africa and tell what each secured. 



" II. The Expansion of England 

733- England in America ; the Dominion of Canada The 

separation of the thirteen American colonies from England in 
1776 (sec. 541) seemed to give a fatal blow to English hopes of 
estabhshing a great colonial empire in America. But half of 
North America still remained in English hands. 

of the population of the colony vary from nine millions to fifteen millions. A rail- 
road projected by Stanley, two hundred and fifty miles in length, has been built 
around the falls of the Congo. This enterprise has brought into touch with civiliza- 
tion a vast region which throughout all the long period of history up to the time of 
Stanley's achievement had been absolutely cut off from communication with the 
civilized races of mankind, 

6 France established a protectorate over Morocco in 1912. It was the German 
Kaiser's unjustified intervention with threat of arms in Moroccan matters that tended 
greatly to increase that tension between Germany on the one hand and France and 
Great Britain on the other which was an important factor in the European situation 
just preceding the catastrophe of 19 14 (see Supplemental Chapter XLV, sees. 770, 773). 



670 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

Gradually the attractions of British North America as a dwelling- 
place for settlers of European stock became known. Immigration, 
mostly from the British Isles, increased in volume, so that the 
growth of the country in population during the nineteenth cen- 
tury was phenomenal, rising from about a quarter of a million at 
the opening of the period to over five miUions at its close. 

One of the most important matters in the political history of 
Canada since the country passed under English rule is the granting 
of responsible government to the provinces in 1841. Up to that 
time England's colonial system was in principle like that which 
had resulted in the loss to the British Empire of the thirteen 
colonies. The concession marked a new era in the history of 
English colonization. The Canadian provinces now became in 
all home matters absolutely self-governing.^ 

The concession of complete self-government to the provinces 
was followed, in 1867, by the union of Upper and Lower Canada, 
Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick in a federal state under the name 
of the Dominion of Canada.^ The constitution of the Dominion, 
save as to the federal principle, is modeled after the British, 
wherein it differs from the recently framed Australian consti- 
tution, which follows closely that of the United States. 

The political union of the provinces made possible the success- 
ful accomplishment of one of the great engineering undertakings 
of our age. This was the construction of a transcontinental rail- 
road from Montreal to Vancouver. This road has done for the 
confirming of the federal union and for the industrial develop- 
ment of the Dominion what the building of similar transcontinen- 
tal lines has done for the United States. 

By reason of its vast geographical extent, — its area is more 
than thirty-five times as great as that of the British Isles, — its 
inexhaustible mineral deposits, its unrivaled fisheries, its limitless 
forests, grazing lands, and wheat fields, its bracing cHmate, and 

7 The treaty-making power and matters of peace and war are still in the hands of 
the English government. 

8 Later the confederation was joined by British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, 
and other provinces. Newfoundland has steadily refused to join the xmion. 



ENGLAND IN AUSTRALASIA 6/1 

above all its free institutions, the Dominion of Canada seems 
marked out to be one of the great future homes of the Anglo- 
Saxon race. What the United States now is, the Dominion seems 
destined at a time not very remote to become. 

734. England in Australasia;^ the proclamation of the Com- 
monwealth of Australia (1901). — About the time that England 
lost her American colonies the celebrated navigator Captain Cook 
reached and explored the shores of New Zealand and Australia 
(1769-17 71). Disregarding the claims of earlier visitors to these 
lands, he took possession of the islands for the British crown. 

The best use to which England could at first think to put the 
new lands was to make them a place of exile for criminals. The 
first shipload of convicts was landed at Botany Bay in Austraha 
in 1788. But the agricultural riches of the new lands, their 
adaptabiUty to stock raising, and the healthfulness of the climate 
soon drew to them a stream of English immigrants. In 185 1 
came the announcement of the discovery of fabulously rich 
deposits of gold, and then set in a tide of immigration such as 
the world has seldom seen. 

Before the close of the century five flourishing colonies (New 
South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, and West 
Australia), with an aggregate population, including that of the 
neighboring island of Tasmania, of almost four milHons, had 
grown up along the fertile well-watered rim of the Australian 
continent and had developed free institutions similar to those 
of the mother country. 

The great political event in the history of these colonies was 
their consolidation, just at the opening of the twentieth century, 
into the Commonwealth of Australia, a federal union like our own. 

The vast possibihties of the future of this new Anglo-Saxon 
commonwealth in the South Pacific has impressed in an unwonted 
way the imagination of the world. It is possible that in the 

9 Australasia, meaning " south land of Asia," is the name under which Australia and 
New Zealand are comprehended. Here, as in South Africa, in Canada, and in India, 
England appeared late on the ground. The Spaniards and the Dutch had both pre- 
ceded her. The presence of the Dutch is witnessed by the names New Holland (the 
earlier name of Australia) and New Zealand attaching to the greater islands. 



6/2 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

coming periods of history this new Britain will hold some such 
place in the Pacific as the motherland now holds in the Atlantic. 

735. England in Asia. — We have noted the founding of the 
British Empire in India (sec. 540). Throughout the nineteenth 
century England steadily advanced the frontiers of her dominions 
here and consolidated her power until by the close of the century 
she had brought either under her direct rule or under her suze- 
rainty more than three hundred millions of Asiatics,^*^ — the largest 
number of human beings, so far as history knows, ever united 
under a single scepter. 

We must here note how England's occupation of India and 
her large interests in the trade of Southern and Eastern Asia 
involved her during the century in several wars and shaped in 
great measure her foreign policies. One of the earliest of these 
wars was that known as the Afghan War of 1838-184 2, into which 
she was drawn through her jealousy of Russia.-^^ 

At the same time England became involved in the so-called 
Opium War with China ^^ (i 839-1 842). As a result of this war 
England obtained by cession from China the island and port of 
Hongkong, which she has made one of the most important 
commercial and naval stations of her empire. Iri 1901 over 
twenty-four thousand vessels entered the ports of the island. 

Scarcely was the Opium War ended before England was 
involved in a gigantic struggle with Russia, — the Crimean 
War, already spoken of in connection with Russian history (sec. 
722). From our present standpoint we can better understand 

1^ By the census of 191 1 the population of the British Indian Empire (this includes 
the feudatory states) was 315,156,396. 

11 England's endeavor here was to maintain Afghanistan as a buffer state between 
her Indian possessions and the expanding Russian Empire, There was a second 
Afghan War in 1879-1880. 

12 The opium traffic between India and China had grown into gigantic proportions 
and had become a source of wealth to the British merchants and of revenue to the 
Indian government. The Chinese government, however, awake to the evils of the 
growing use of the narcotic, resisted the importation of the drug. This was the cause 
of the war. In 1907 an agreement was made between China and England in which 
the importation of opium into China from India was to be annually reduced in 
amount. This agreement was renewed in 191 1, with a view to the extinction of the 
trade within the following ten years. 



ENGLAND IN ASIA 673 

why England threw herself into the conflict on the side of 
Turkey. She fought to maintain the integrity of the Ottoman 
Empire in order that her own great rival, Russia, might be pre- 
vented from seizing Constantinople and the Bosporus, and from 
that. point controlling the affairs of Asia through the command 
of the Eastern Mediterranean. 

The echoes of the Crimean War had barely died away before 
England was startled by the most alarming intelUgence from the 
country for the secure possession of which English soldiers had 
borne their part in the fierce struggle before Sevastopol. 

In 1857 there broke out in the armies of the East India Com- 
pany what is known as the Sepoy Mutiny .^^ Fortunately many 
of the native regiments stood firm in their allegiance to England, 
and with their aid the revolt was speedily crushed. As a conse- 
quence of the mutiny the government of India was by act of 
Parliament taken out of the hands of the East India Company 
and vested in the English crown. 

There are without question offsets to the indisputably good 
results of English rule in India; nevertheless it is one of the 
most important facts of modern history, and one of special 
import as bearing on our present study, that over three hun- 
dred millions of the population of Asia should thus have passed, 
whether for better or for worse, under the rule and wardship of 
a European nation. 



13 The causes of the uprising were various. The crowd of deposed princes was 
one element of discontent. A widespread conviction among the natives, awakened by 
different acts of the English, that their religion was in danger was another of the 
causes that led to the rebellion. There were also military grievances of which the 
native soldiers complained. The mutiny broke out simultaneously at different points. 
The atrocities committed by the rebels at Cawnpur sent a thrill of horror throughout 
the civilized world. Nana Sahib had slain the garrison and crowded about two hun- 
dred English women and children into a small chamber. They were spared the fate 
of the prisoners in the Black Hole of Calcutta (sec. 540, n. 14), but only to meet a 
more terrible one. Fearing that the English forces, advancing by forced marches 
under General Henry Havelock, would effect a rescue of the prisoners. Nana Sahib 
employed five assassins to go into the room with their swords and knives and kill 
them all. The work required two hours. Then the bodies were dragged out and flung 
into a neighboring well, where they were found by the rescuing party, which arrived 
just too hte to prevent the tragedy. 



6/4 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

736. England in South Africa; Boer and Briton England 

has played a great part in the partition of Africa, and has secured 
the largest share of the spoils, not as to the size of her portion 
but as to its real value. Her first appearance upon the continent 
both in Egypt and at the Cape was brought about through her 
solicitude for her East India possessions and the security of her 
routes thither. Later she joined in the scramble of European 
powers for African territories for their own sake. 

The Dutch had preceded the EngUsh in South Africa. They 
began their settlement at the Cape about the middle of the sev- 
enteenth century in the great days of Holland. During the French 
Revolution and again during Napoleon's ascendancy the Enghsh 
took the Dutch colony under their protection. After the down- 
fall of Napoleon in 18 14 the colony was ceded to England by 
the Netherlands.^^ 

The Dutch settlers refused to become reconciled to the English 
rule. In 1836 a large number of these aggrieved colonists took 
the heroic resolve of abandoning their old homes and going out 
into the African wilderness in search of new ones. This was a 
resolution worthy of their ancestry, for these African Pilgrims 
were descendants of those Dutch patriots who fought so hero- 
ically against Philip II, and of Huguenot refugees who in the 
seventeenth century fled from France to escape the tyranny of 
Louis XIV (sec. 449). 

This migration is known as "The Great Trek."^^ The immi- 
grants journeyed from the Cape towards the northeast, driving 
their herds before them and carrying their women and children 
and all their earthly goods in great clumsy ox carts. Beyond the 
Orange River some of the immigrants unyoked their oxen and 
set up ho'mes, laying there the basis of the Orange Free State ; 
the more intrepid " trekked " still farther to the north, across the 
Vaal River, and established the republic of the Transvaal. 

14 After the loss of the Cape Settlement the island of Java was the most important 
colonial possession remaining to the Dutch. Gradually they got possession of the 
greater part of the large island of Sumatra. These two islands form the heart of the 
Dutch East Indies of to-day, which embrace a native population of about 36,000,000. 

15 Trek is Dutch for *' migration " or " journey." 



ENGLAND IN SOUTH AFRICA 6/5 

TwQ generations passed, a period filled for the little republics, 
surrounded by hostile African tribes, with anxieties and fighting. 
Then there came a turning point in their history. In the year 
1885 gold deposits of extraordinary richness were discovered in 
the Transvaal. Straightway there began a tremendous inrush of 
miners and adventurers from all parts of the globe. 

A great portion of these newcomers were English-speaking 
people. As aliens — Uitlanders, " outlanders," they were called 
— they were excluded from any share in the government, although 
they made up two thirds of the population of the little state and 
paid the greater part of the taxes. They demanded the fran- 
chise. The Boers, under the lead of the sturdy President of the 
Transvaal, Paul Kriiger, refused to accede to their demands, urging 
that this would mean practically the surrender of the independ- 
ence of the Republic and its annexation to the British Empire. 

The controversy grew more and more bitter and soon ripened 
into war between England and the Transvaal (1-899). The Orange 
Free State joined its little army to that of its sister state, — an 
act in which James Bryce declares there was " an heroic quality 
not surpassed by anything in the history of the classical peoples."^® 

At the outset the Boers, who are very expert with their rifles, 
were everywhere successful, inflicting one disastrous defeat after 
another upon the English forces, while the world looked on in 
amazement. The British Empire in Africa was threatened with 
destruction. England was stirred as she had not been stirred 
since the Sepoy Mutiny in India. An army of three hundred 
thousand men, gathered from all parts of the British Empire, 
was hastily thrown into South Africa, and the supreme command 
intrusted to the able and experienced general. Lord Roberts. 
After the maintenance of the struggle for over two years the last of 
the Boer bands surrendered (1902). As the outcome of the war 
both of the republics were annexed to the British Empire under 
the names of the Transvaal Colony and Orange River Colony. 

16 The total European or white population of the two little republics that thus 
threw down the gage of battle to the most powerful empire of modem times was 
only a little over 300,000. 



e^e EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

Only a few years had passed after the close of the war when 
the British government very wisely granted the two colonies self- 
government. Straightway these states and Cape Colony with 
Natal joined in the creation of a federal commonwealth under 
the name of the Union of South Africa" (19 lo). Thus was con- 
summated the favorite project of the South African statesman 
Cecil Rhodes (1853-1902), the " empire builder," one of the most 
masterful men of his generation. 

The act of the British government in intrusting the Boers with 
responsible government won in such measure their loyalty to the 
Empire that at the outbreak of the great European war in 19 14 
they rallied — though not quite unanimously — to the support of 
England, and in the name of the Empire conquered German 
Southwest Africa and German East Africa. 

One of the most important enterprises of the English in 
Africa is the building of a Cape-to-Cairo railroad. This, like the 
political scheme of a federation, was also a favorite project of Cecil 
Rhodes. Already his dream has been in great part realized. The 
projected line has been carried forward from Cape Town over 
fifteen hundred miles to the celebrated Victoria Falls on the 
Zambezi, while at the other end of the continent the road has 
been pushed up the Nile from Cairo to Khartum, a distance of 
over thirteen hundred miles (including a little over two hundred 
miles of river navigation above Assuan). This railroad when 
completed, as without doubt it will be at a date not remote, will 
be a potent factor in the opening up of the Dark Continent to 
civilization. 

737. England in Egypt. — In 1876 England and France, in 
order to secure against loss their subjects who were holders 
of Egyptian bonds, established a joint control over Egypt 
which at that time was nominally a hereditary principality 
under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Porte. A few years later 
there broke out in the Egyptian army a mutiny against the 

1'' The population of the Union according to the census of 191 1 is about 7,000,000, 
of which about 1,250,000 are Europeans and the rest native or colored. Gold and 
diamond mining is the leading industry. 



ENGLAND IN EGYPT 6// 

authority of the Khedive. France declining to act with Eng- 
land in suppressing the disorder, England moved alone in the 
matter. As a result the Anglo-French control became a sole 
British control.^^ 

In 1885 a second expedition had to be sent out to the same 
country. The Sudanese, subjects of the Khedive, had revolted 
and were threatening the Egyptian garrisons in the Sudan with 
destruction. An Anglo- Egyptian army pushed its way up the 
Nile to the relief of Khartum, which General Gordon, the mod- 
ern English knight-errant, was holding against the Mahdi, the 
military prophet and leader of the Sudanese Arabs. The expe- 
dition arrived too late, Khartum having fallen just before relief 
reached the town. Gordon perished with most of his followers. 

The English troops were now recalled and the Sudan was aban- 
doned to the rebel Arabs. For over a decade this southern land 
remained under the cruel rule of the Mahdi and his successor. 
The country was devastated by fire and sword, and Egypt was 
continually harassed by raids of the dervishes. 

Finally in 1896 the Enghsh sent up the Nile another expedition 
under General Kitchener for the recovery of the lost territory. The 
undertaking was successful, and the Eastern Sudan and a vast ter- 
ritory embracing the basin of the Nile and its tributaries were 
again brought under the rule of the Khedive, that is to say, under 
the administrative control of England (1898). 

No part of the world has benefited more by European control 
than Egypt. When England assumed the administration of its 
affairs it was in every respect one of the most wretched of the 
lands under the rule, actual or nominal, of the Turkish Sultan. 
The country is now, according to the claims of eminent English 
authority, more prosperous than at any previous period of its 
history, not excepting the time of the rule of the Pharaohs. This 
high degree of prosperity has been secured mainly through Eng- 
land's having given^ Egypt the two things declared necessary to 
its prosperity, — "justice and water." 

18 In the first year of the World War, Turkey having entered the war on the side 
of Germany, Great Britain declared an actual protectorate over Egypt. 



6/8 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

The construction of the great irrigation or storage dam across 
the Nile at the First Cataract (at Assuan) is one of the greatest 
engineering achievements of modern times. The dam retains the 
surplus waters of the Nile in flood times and releases them grad- 
ually during the months of low water. This constant supply of 
water for irrigation purposes will, it is estimated, increase by a 
third the agricultural capabiHties of Egypt not only by greatly 
augmenting the area of fertile soil but by making it possible on 
much of the land to raise two and even three crops each year. 



III. The Expansion of France 

738. France in Africa. — At the opening of the nineteenth 
century France possessed only fragments of a once promising 
colonial empire. From the long Napoleonic Wars she emerged 
too exhausted to give any attention for a time to interests out- 
side of the homeland. 

When finally she began to look about her for over-the-sea ter- 
ritories to make good her losses in America and Asia, it was the 
North African shore which on account of proximity (it is only 
twenty-four hours distant by steam from the southern ports of 
France), climate, and products naturally attracted her attention. 
This region possesses great agricultural resources. In ancient 
times it was one of the richest grain- tribute-paying provinces of 
the Roman Empire. Its climate is favorable for Latin- European 
settlement. It is really geographically a part of Europe, " the 
true Africa beginning with the Sahara." 

France began the conquest of Algeria as early as 1830. The 
subjugation of the country was not effected without much hard 
fighting with the native tribes and a great expenditure in men 
and money. In the year 1881, under the necessity of defending 
her Algerian frontier against the raids of the mountain tribes 
of Tunis on the east, France sent troops into that country 
and estabUshed a protectorate over it. This act of hers deeply 
offended the Italians, who had had their eye upon this district, 



FRANCE IN AFRICA 679 

regarding it as belonging to them by virtue of its geographical 
position as well as its historical traditions.^^ 

These North African territories form the most promising por- 
tion of France's new colonial empire. The more sanguine of her 
statesmen entertain hopes of ultimately creating here a new home 
for the French people, — a sort of New France. In any event it 
seems certain that all these shore lands, which in the seventh cen- 
tury were severed from Europe by the Arabian conquests, are now 
again permanently reunited to that continent and are henceforth 
to constitute virtually a part of the European world. 

Besides these lands in North Africa, France possesses a vast 
domain in the region of the Senegal and lays claim to all the 
Sahara lying between her colony of Senegal and Algeria. She also 
holds extensive territories just north of the Congo Free State, 
embracing part of Central Sudan. The island of Madagascar 
also forms a part of the French-African empire. 

It is to be feared that France will not find in Africa any such 
valuable possessions as in the eighteenth century she lost to Eng- 
land in America and Asia. Yet she has entered upon the work 
of opening up and developing her African empire with character- 
istic enthusiasm and expansiveness of plans. She has projects 
that aim at the redemption, by means of artesian wells, of exten- 
sive tracts of the Sahara. It is thought not impracticable to 
create a line of these oases across the Sahara from the city of 
Constantine in Algeria to Timbuktu in the Sudan, and thus 
to faciHtate the construction of a projected Trans-Saharan railway. 

739. France in Asia. — In the year 1862 France secured a 
foothold near the mouth of the Cambodia River in Indo- China 
and has since then steadily enlarged her possessions until now she 

19 Disappointed in not getting Tunis, the Italians sought to secure a foothold on 
the Red Sea coast. They seized here a district and organized it under the name of 
the Colony of Eritrea ; but they had hard luck almost from the first. The coast is 
hot and unhealthy and inland is the kingdom of Abyssinia. Over this the Italians 
attempted to establish a protectorate ; but unfortunately for them Abyssinia does not 
regard herself as one of the uncivilized or moribund states over which it is necessary 
for Europeans to extend their protection. King Menelik of that country inflicted upon 
the Italian army a most disastrous defeat (1896). For something regarding the seizure 
by the Italians of Tripoli in North Africa, see Supplemental Chapter XLV, sec. 775. 



68o EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

holds in those quarters territories which exceed in extent the 
homeland. A chief aim of the French in this region is to secure 
the trade of Southern China. To this end they are projecting the 
extension northward into China of the system of railways they 
have already constructed. 

With these ample African and Asiatic territories France feels 
in a measure consoled for her losses in the past. As a colonizing 
state, however, France has one great handicap. She has never 
had a rapidly increasing population at home from which to aug- 
ment her colonies. Nor have her citizens that restless, adventur- 
ous spirit of the Anglo-Saxons which has driven them as conquerors 
and settlers into the remotest parts of the earth and made England 
the mother of innumerable colonies and states. 

IV. The Expansion of Germany 

740. German Emigrants lost to Germany. — No country of 
Europe during the expansion movement of the nineteenth cen- 
tury supplied a greater number of emigrants for the settlement 
of transoceanic lands than Germany. But Germany did not until 
recently possess under her own flag any over-the-sea territories, 
and consequently the vast number of emigrants she sent out 
sought homes in the United States, in the different English 'colo- 
nies, in the Spanish and Portuguese republics of South America, 
and even in the Asiatic provinces of the Ottoman Empire. Thus 
it happened that although Germany during the century sent out 
vast swarms of emigrants no true Greater Germany grew up 
outside of Europe. 

Stimulated by the successful war of 1870-187 1 against France, 
and the consolidation of the German Empire, German statesmen 
began to dream of making Germany a world power. To this 
end it was deemed necessary to secure for Germany colonies 
where the German emigrants might live under the German flag 
and, instead of contributing to the growth and prosperity of 
rival states, should remain Germans and constitute a part of the 
German nation. 



GERMANY IN AFRICA AND ASIA 68l 

741. Germany in Africa. — Consequently when the competition 
came for African territory Germany entered into the struggle with 
great zeal and got a fair share of the spoils. In 1 884 she declared 
a protectorate over a large region on the southwest coast of the 
continent just north of the Orange River, and thus lying partly 
in the temperate zone. This region she opened up to civilization 
by the construction of a railroad over two hundred and thirty miles 
in length running from the west coast inland.^*^ 

At almost the same time she established two smaller protect- 
orates in the tropic belt farther to the north. On the East 
African coast she seized a great territory, twice as large as Ger- 
many itself, embracing a part of the celebrated Lake District. 
These upland regions are well adapted to European settlement 
and must in time be filled by people of European descent. 

742. Germany in Asia. — The hopes of many German expan- 
sionists were centered in Western Asia rather than in Africa. 
Thousands of Germans crowded into i\sia Minor and Syria and 
formed in some districts an important element of the industrial 
and trading population. It is said to have been the hope of 
William II that ultimately Asia Minor and Syria would come 
to form a part of the German Empire. If the process of the 
Germanization of those regions had continued, it is not at all 
unlikely that a large part of Western Asia would have come 
eventually into very close political as well as economic relations 
with Germany. 

One of the most important projects of the Germans in these 
Asian regions was the extension of the Anatolian Railway from 
Konieh in Asia Minor down the Euphrates valley to Bagdad 
on the lower Tigris. Such a line would have greatly enhanced 
German influence in Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, but this 
dream of dominion was shattered by the war of 19 14 when the 
English armies gained complete control of the country. This rail- 
way when completed will open up the wonderfully fertile regions 

20 In 1904 the German government was forced to face a serious revolt of some of 
the native tribes of the protectorate, which was suppressed only after three years of 
cruel warfare. 



682 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

which formed the heart and core of the early and populous 
empires of the Assyrian and the Babylonian kings.^^ 

German expansion, prior to the outbreak of the great war of 
19 1 4, pressed not only on the Turkish Empire but upon the 
Chinese Empire as well. In 1897 Germany, on the pretext of 
protecting German missionaries in China, seized the port of Kiau- 
chau and forced its practical cession from the Chinese government. 
This is a spot of great political and commercial importance.^^ 

Such was the position of Germany in the colonial world at the 
end of the nineteenth century. Before the second decade of the 
twentieth century had fairly opened, there came the startling 
revelation that German colonial enterprises and economic under- 
takings, particularly those in Asian Turkey, concealed political 
ambitions and military plans whose aims were nothing less than, 
world domination. 

V. The Expansion of Russia 

743. Russia's Outward Movement.' — Russia has large and 
numerous inland lakes and seas and vast rivers, but she lacks 
seaboard. Her effort to reach the sea in different directions is, 
as we have learned, the key to much of her history. It is this 
which gave a special character to nineteenth-century Russian 
expansion, — which made it a movement by land instead of by 
sea, as in the case of all the other European states that had a 
part in the great expansion movement. 

The expansion of Russia was one of the most striking features 
of the great European development which we are following. 
Her conquests and colonizations put her in possession of about 
one seventh of the habitable earth and made her one of the 
most potent political factors in the modern world. 

21 Along with this railway project is being discussed a proposal for the restoration 
of the ancient irrigation works of the Tigris and Euphrates region. What has 
already been done for Egypt by the building of the great storage Nile dam at 
Assuan will almost certainly at no remote date be repeated here in what was formerly 
the " Asian Egypt." 

22 Besides the colonial possessions named, Germany at the beginning of the 
great war held a number of islands and groups of islands in the Pacific. 



RUSSIAN EXPANSION IN ASIA 683 

744. Russian Expansion in Asia ; her Three Lines of Advance. 

Throughout the nineteenth century Russia steadily gravitated 

towards the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and the Pacific. 
Only in Europe was her glacier-like movement much impeded by 
the obstacles placed in her path by the jealousy of the other Euro- 
pean powers. She made no material territorial gains in Europe, 
aside from the acquisition of Finland and part of Prussian Poland, 
during the nineteenth century, though she fought in three great 
wars for this end and shattered into fragments a great part of the 
Turkish Empire which lay between her and the chief goal of her 
ambition — the Mediterranean. 

But in Asia the additions which Russia made to her empire 
during the nineteenth century were not only immense in extent 
but most important to her politically and commercially. These 
annexations will best be remembered if we bear in mind the three 
chief objects Russia had in view in her Asiatic acquisitions. 
These were the securing of an outlet on the Persian Gulf, the 
opening of an overland route to India, and the securing of ice-free 
ports on the Pacific. 

In pursuit of the first object Russia, during the nineteenth 
century, conquered and absorbed the Caucasus and the Trans- 
caucasian region. She thus dominated Northern Persia, and it is 
surmised that she secretly secured from the Persian government 
the lease of Bender Abbas on the Persian Gulf and the concession 
for the construction of a railway across Persia from the Caspian 
Sea to this southern port.^^ Thus Russia's expansion in this 
quarter gave her a commanding position in Western Asia which 
made her a formidable competitor with Germany and England 
for the political control of Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and Persia. 

After Russia's failure in the Crimean War and in the war 
of 1878 against Turkey to secure Constantinople, she began 
" searching in the deserts of Central Asia for the key to the 

23 But England stood guard here just as she did at the Dardanelles. She declared 
a sort of Monroe Doctrine for the Persian Gulf and warned off Russia and all other 
powers. She had good ground for her action, for the establishment of a Russian 
naval station on the Persian Gulf would have destroyed the security of England's 
route to India by way of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. 



684 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

Bosporus " ; that is to say, Russia's policy was to push her 
outposts within striking distance of India, not with a view to 
wresting that country from England, but with the object of 
gaining a strong position from which she might sometime dic- 
tate terms to England respecting the disposition of the estate 
of the " sick man " of the Bosporus.-* 

Thus during the latter half of the nineteenth century Russia 
steadily pushed forward her boundaries in Central Asia. She 
conquered or conciliated the tribes of Turkestan and advanced her 
frontier in this quarter far towards the south, — close up against 
Afghanistan. In the very heart of the continent her outposts 
were now established upon the lofty table-lands of the Pamirs, 
the " Roof of the World." Here her frontier and that of the 
British Empire were only twenty miles apart. The apprehension 
with which Russia's steady advance in these regions was viewed 
by England is shown by the constant efforts she made to prevent 
Russian influence from becoming dominant in Afghanistan and 
to increase her own influence in that quarter.^^ 

In the extreme eastern part of Asia, Russia obtained from 
China the lease of Port Arthur (1898), one of the most important 
Asiatic harbors on the Pacific,' and occupied the large Chinese 
province of Manchuria, which occupation it was generally believed 
would end in the actual annexation of that magnificent domain 
to the Russian Empire. Manchuria is probably better adapted 
to European settlement than any other thinly peopled region in 
Asia, and can hardly fail to become, if it remains in Russian hands, 
the chief center of European population in the Far East. 

Thus in her expansion Russia not only subjugated the wild 
nomadic tribes of Northern and Central Asia, but she also wrested 
territories from the three semi-civilized states of the continent, — 



24 This was the political motive actuating Russia in making her acquisitions in 
these regions. There were of course many other grounds for her activity. She 
wanted to secure lands for the settlement of her peasant colonists ; she must needs 
in self-defense establish order among the restless and plundering tribes on her 
frontier ; and she wanted to open up a route by which to reach the markets of India 
and draw to herself at least a part of the trade of British India. 

25 See sec. 735, n. 11. 



THE TRANS-SIBERIAN RAILWAY 685 

Turkey, Persia, and China, — and crowded heavily upon all these 
countries, besides threatening to absorb the buffer state of Afghan- 
istan. She overshadowed Europe and dominated Asia. It is not 
a matter of wonder that the steady growth of this " Colossus of 
the North " awakened the apprehension of the rulers of India and 
influenced them to thwart her apparently boundless ambition in 
every possible way. 

The outward movement we have traced gave Russia a physical 
basis which insured her a rapid and unimpeded development. It 
made her a competitor for a place among the three or four prob- 
able world powers of the future. It made pertinent the question, 
Will Slav or Saxon mold the destinies of the coming time .'' 

745. The Trans-Siberian Railway Russia's most noteworthy 

undertaking in connection with her Asiatic empire was the build- 
ing of the Trans-Siberian Railway, which connects Moscow with 
Vladivostok, the Russian port on the Pacific, This was one of the 
most gigantic enterprises of its kind of our age. The building of 
this road has done as much as any other single achievement of the 
past century to make the world small. Its effect upon political 
relations in the Far East is profound. It caused Russia to face 
the Pacific. It made accessible to Russian settlers the vast fertile 
regions of Southern Siberia, and will be one of the chief factors 
in ultimately rendering that country a part of the civilized world ; 
for though it may be true as to the past that "civilization has 
come riding on a gun carriage," now it comes riding on a 
locomotive. 



VI. The Expansion of the United States 

746. The Growth of the United States a Part of the Great Euro- 
pean Expansion Movement At first view it might seem that the 

growth of our own country should not be given a place in the 
present chapter. But the expansion of the United States is as 
truly a part of European expansion as is the increase of the Eng- 
lish race in Canada, or in Australasia, or in South Africa. The 
circumstance that the development here has taken place since 



686 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

the severance of all political ties binding this country to the 
motherland is wholly immaterial. The Canadian, Australian, and 
African developments have as a matter of fact been expansion 
movements from practically secondary and independent centers 
of European settlement. 

Hence to complete our survey of the movement which has put 
in possession or in control of the European peoples so much of 
the earth, we must note — we can simply note — the expansion 
during the past century of the great American Commonwealth. 

747. How the Territorial Acquisitions of the United States and 
its Growth in Population have contributed to assure the Predomi- 
nance of the Anglo-Saxon Race in Greater Europe. — Six times dur- 
ing the nineteenth century the United States materially enlarged 
her borders.^^ These gains in territory were in the main at the 
expense of a Latin race, — the Spanish. They have not therefore 
resulted in an actual increase in the possessions of the European 
peoples, but have simply contributed to the predominance, or 
have marked the growing predominance, in this new-forming 
European world of the Anglo-Saxon race. 

Of even greater significance than the territorial expansion of 
the United States during the past century is the amazing growth 
of the Republic during this period in population and in material 
and intellectual resources. At the opening of the century the 
white population of the United States was a little over four mil- 
lions ; it has now risen to about one hundred millions. This is 
the largest aggregate of human force and intelligence that the 
world has yet seen. Even more impressive than its actual are its 

26 Just at the end of the century the territorial expansion of the United States 
assumed a character altogether unlike that which up to that time it had retained. 
All our chief earlier acquisitions were lands contiguous to our previous possessions, 
were unoccupied or practically unoccupied, were adapted to European settlement, 
and were secured with the intention of making them into territories which might 
ultimately be carved into states and made an integral part of the Federal Union, 
But in 1898, as an outcome of our war with Spain, we acquired Porto Rico and the 
Philippine Islands. In the latter islands we came into possession of lands already 
peopled with an Asiatic race, and, moreover, lands unfitted for settlement by people 
of European stock. The acquisition by the United States of these Asiatic tropical 
dependencies has created for our government and our people many problems, some 
of which still remain unsolved. 



SHALL CHINA BE PARTITIONED? 68/ 

potential capacities. With practically unlimited room for expan- 
sion by reason of the territorial acquisitions we have noted, it is 
i?npossible adequately to realize into what, during the coming 
centuries, the American people will grow. 

This remarkable growth of an English-speaking nation on the 
soil of the New World has contributed more than anything else, 
save the expansion of Great Britain into Greater Britain, to lend 
impressiveness and import to the movement indicated by the 
expression, "European expansion." 

VII. Situations and Problems created by the 
European Race Expansion 

748. Shall China be partitioned? — The outward movement of 
the European peoples which we have now traced in broad outHnes 
has raised several of the most serious problems that civilization 
has ever faced, and has created situations well calculated while 
awakening profound apprehensions to create also vast hopes. 

One of the problems raised is altogether like the old (and 
yet ever new) problem — the so-called Eastern Question. It is, 
What shall be done with the "sick man" of the Far East? 
Shall China be partitioned? 

This question we repeat has been raised by the great European 
race expansion and can be understood only when viewed as a result 
of the pressure of the Occidental upon the Oriental world. In the 
following paragraphs we shall endeavor in the briefest way possible 
to put in their causal and logical relations the series of events 
forming the antecedents and the causes of the present situation 
in Eastern Asia. 

749. The Awakening of Japan. — Bearing directly upon the 
question of the future of China is the recent wonderful awaken- 
ing of Japan. At the middle of the nineteenth century Japan 
was a hermit nation. She jealously excluded foreigners and 
refused to enter into diplomatic relations with the Western 
powers. But in the year 1854 Commodore Perry of the United 
States secured from the Japanese government concessions which 



688 



EUROPEAN EXPANSION 



opened the country to Western influences, under which Japan 
soon awoke to a new life. 

During the last half century the progress made by Japan on 
all lines, political, material, and intellectual, has been something 
without a parallel in history. She has transformed her ancient 
feudal divine-right government into a 
representative constitutional system 
modeled upon the political institutions of 
the West. She has adopted almost entire 
the material side of the civilization of the 
Western nations and has eagerly absorbed 
their sciences. 

But what has taken place, it should be 
carefully noted, is not a Europeanization 
of Japan. The new Japan is an evolution 
of the old. The Japanese to-day in their 
innermost life, in their deepest instincts, 
and in their modes of thought are still 
an Oriental people. 

750. Chino- Japanese War of 1894 ; a 
Mongolian Monroe Doctrine. — In 1894 
came the war between Japan and China. 
A chief cause of this war was China's 
claim to suzerainty over Korea and her 
efforts to secure control of the affairs of 
that country. But under the conditions 
of modern warfare, and particularly in view of the Russian 
advance in Eastern Asia, the maintenance of Korea as an inde- 
pendent state seems to Japan absolutely necessary to the security 
of her island empire. The situation is vividly pictured in these 
words of Okakura-Kakuzo, the author of The Awakening of Japan : 




Fig. 109. — The Impe- 
rial Regalia of Japan 27 
(After a drawing by Goji 
Ukitd) 



27 This regalia consists of a mirror, a sword, and several tusk-shaped jewels. Of 
all the royal or imperial regalias in the world, this is the simplest, and the most 
symboUc and historically interesting. According to Japanese legend, the imperial 
emblems were a gift of the Sun-goddess to an ancestor of the first Emperor of Japan. 
The goddess accompanied the bestowal of the symbols with these words : " Look 
upon this mirror as if it were my own spirit, and reverence it as you would my own 




Sanshaii-tau 
I. 



CHINA IN PROCESS OF DISMEMBERMENT 689 

"Any hostile power," he says, "in occupation of the peninsula 
might easily throw an army into Japan, for Korea lies like a dagger 
ever pointed toward the very heart of Japan." 

Still again, realizing that greed of territory would lead the Euro- 
pean powers sooner or later to seek the partition of China and the 
political control of the Mongolian lands of the Far East, Japan 
wished to stir China from her lethargy, make herself her adviser 
and leader, and thus get in a position to control the aifairs of 
Eastern Asia. In a word she was resolved to set up a sort of 
Monroe Doctrine in her part of the world, which should close 
Mongolian lands against European encroachments and preserve 
for Asiatics what was still left of Asia. 

The war was short and decisive. It was a fight between David 
and Goliath. China with her great inert mass was absolutely help- 
less in the hands of her tiny antagonist. With the Japanese army 
in full march upon Peking the Chinese government was forced to 
sue for peace. China now recognized the independence of Korea, 
and ceded to Japan Formosa and the extreme southern part of 
Manchuria, including Port Arthur. But at this juncture of affairs, 
Russia, supported by France and Germany, jealously intervened. 

presence. For centuries upon centuries shall thy descendants rule this kingdom. 
Govern this country with purity like that of the light that radiates from the surface 
of the mirror. Deal with thy subjects with the gentleness typified by the bland and 
soft luster of the jewels. Combat the enemies of thy empire with this sword." No 
other royal regalia is so intimately related to the national life of a people as are 
these sacred emblems of Japan. Respecting this we quote from a most interesting 
paper on the subject, read before the Japan Society of London, in 1902, by Mr. 
Ukita, Chancellor of the Imperial Japanese Legation : "In conclusion, I should like 
to say one word in regard to the significance of the regalia in the mind of the Jap- 
anese people. The emblems, as I have pointed out, symbolize Knowledge, Courage, 
and Mercy ; and it has always been held that unless a ruler be possessed of all these 
three virtues, he will be powerless to govern the country in peace and prosperity. 
With this in mind, the importance of the regalia, which symbolizes these three 
virtues, can be easily imagined. Its influence on the people is enormous. Coming 
from the gods to Zimmu, the first Emperor, himself a descendant of the gods, its 
existence dates from the very foundation of the Japanese Empire. Without it the 
Empire would hardly be conceivable to the Japanese people. The whole tradition 
of the imperial family is bound up in it; its possession bestows sovereignty by 
divine right; and the instinct of the people ... is to acknowledge no man as 
Emperor unless he possess the regal symbols." See Transactions and Proceedings 
of the Japan Society (London) for 1901-1902, vol. vi. 



690 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

These powers forced Japan to accept a money indemnity in lieu of 
territory on the continent. She was permitted, however, to take 
possession of the island of Formosa. 

751. China in Process of Dismemberment ; the Boxer Uprising 
(1900). — The march of the little Japanese army into the heart of 
the huge Chinese Empire was in its consequences something like 
the famous march of the Ten Thousand Greeks through the great 
Persian Empire. It revealed the surprising weakness of China — 
a fact known before to all the world but never so perfectly realized 
as after the Japanese exploit — and marked her out for partition. 
The process of dismemberment began without unnecessary delay. 

Germany seized the port of Kiau-chau^^ (sec. 742) and forced 
from China a ninety-nine years' lease of it (January, 1898). She 
lost this to Japan in 19 15. 

Russia asked and received a twenty-five years' lease of Port 
Arthur (March, 1898). This also passed to Japan at the end 
of the Russo-Japanese War (1905). In April, 1898, England 
demanded and received from China Wei-hai-wei. 

France, viewing these cessions to Germany, Russia, and England 
with natural uneasiness, immediately sought and obtained from 
China as compensation a ninety-nine years' lease of the Bay of 
Kwang-chau-wan (April, 1898). 

Italy was now reported to have made demands upon the Chinese 
government for something as compensation to her for what the 
other powers had received. The press in Europe and America 
began openly to discuss the impending partition of the Chinese 
Empire and to speculate as to how the spoils would be divided. 

Suddenly the whole Western world was startled by the intelli- 
gence that the legations or embassies of all the European powers 
at Peking were hemmed in and besieged by a Chinese mob aided 
by the imperial troops. Then quickly followed a report of the 
massacre of all the Europeans in the city. 

Strenuous efforts were at once made by the different Western 
nations, as well as by Japan, to send an international force to the 
rescue of their representatives and the missionaries and other 

28 Or Kiao-chau. 



THE CHINESE REPUBLIC 69I 

Europeans with them, should it chance that any were still alive. 
Not since the Crusades had so many European nations joined in 
a common undertaking. There were in the relief army Russian, 
French, English, American, and German troops, besides a strong 
Japanese contingent. The relief column fought its way through 
to Peking and forced the gates of the capital. The worst had 
not happened, and soon the tension of the Western world, which 
had lasted for six weeks, was relieved by the glad news of the 
rescue of the beleaguered little company of Europeans. 

All which it concerns us now to notice is the place which this 
remarkable passage in Chinese history holds in the story of 
European expansion which we have been rehearsing. The point 
of view to which our study has brought us discloses this at once. 

The insurrection had at bottom for its cause the determination 
of the Chinese to set a limit to the encroachments of the Western 
races, to prevent the dismemberment of their country, to preserve 
China for the Chinese. All the various causes that have been as- 
signed for the uprising are included in this general underlying cause. 

752. The Chinese Republic. — As a result of the Boxer uprising 
China had to agree to pay an indemnity of $325,000,000. The 
country was humiliated, too, by the invasion of the allied troops 
and the flight of the court from Peking. These events aided in 
discrediting the Manchu dynasty, which, during the two and a 
half centuries of its supremacy, had given China some of its ablest 
rulers but had finally become weak and corrupt. Its policy of 
leasing territory to foreign powers and of granting them conces- 
sions for building railroads in return for large loans was strongly 
opposed by many patriotic Chinese. Certain governmental reforms, 
ineffectually carried out, added to the growing dissatisfaction with 
the imperial rule. 

For many years revolutionary ideas had been spreading, espe- 
cially among the more enlightened young men who had studied 
abroad. Finally, in October, 191 1, an outbreak occurred in Han- 
kow, which rapidly gained such strength that the Manchus were 
compelled to abdicate (February 12, 19 12). A provisional repub- 
lican government was inaugurated with Yuan Shih-kai as president. 



692 EUROPEAN EXPANSION 

Although he was considered the ablest statesman in China, he 
was no friend of democracy, and his arbitrary acts led to continu- 
ous conflict with the republican leaders. Open rebellion broke out 
in the summer of 1913 ; but the movement was premature, the 
leaders showed no statesmanlike qualities, and when the ex-Manchu 
general Chang Hsun captured Nanking the uprising immediately 
collapsed. 

In October, 19 13, Yuan Shih-kai was elected permanent presi- 
dent and was inaugurated October 10, the second anniversary of 
the beginning of the revolution. The republic had already been 
recognized by the United States and other American republics, 
and now European governments and Japan gave their recognition. 
In a few weeks the incompetency and obstructive tactics of the 
parliament enabled the president, with popular assent, to make 
himself virtually a dictator. 

In the summer of 1 9 1 5 a movement began for the restoration 
of the monarchy, and on December 11 Yuan Shih-kai announced 
that " in deference to the will of the people " he had consented 
to become emperor. But, owing to a rapidly growing rebellion of 
the southern provinces and probably in part to foreign influence, 
the change in the form of government was revoked, March 22,1916, 
and upon the death of Yuan Shih-kai in June the vice-president, 
Li Yuan-hung, quietly succeeded to the presidency. Many old 
generals, led by Chang Hsun, continued to plot for the overthrow 
of the republic, and in July, 19 17, brought about the retirement 
of the president ; but the vice-president, Feng Kuo-chang, assumed 
the presidency, and the republic appeared likely to be permanent 
in spite of occasional military dominance. 

When the European war broke out in the summer of 19 14 the 
Japanese demanded that Germany hand over to them the leased 
territory of Kiau-chau. As this demand was ignored, Japan de- 
clared war and received the capitulation of Kiau-chau November 7, 
19 1 4. During the military operations the Japanese landed troops 
on Chinese soil, thus violating Chinese neutrality. Japan's aggres- 
sive attitude at this time and in the following months contributed 
to turn China's sympathy to Germany. The Chinese army, too, 



THE CHINESE REPUBLIC 693 

which had been trained and armed by Germans, aided in spreading 
German propaganda. 

It was the influence of the United States that finally aligned 
China with the enemies of Germany. On February 4, 191 7, a 
note was received from the American government stating that it 
had broken off diplomatic relations with Germany as a protest 
a'gainst the unrestricted submarine warfare which Germany had 
begun February i , and inviting the Chinese republic to take simi- 
lar action. On February 9 the Chinese government dispatched a 
note to Berlin declaring that it would sever diplomatic relations 
unless Germany changed its submarine policy. This was hailed 
as a promising sign of virility in the young Chinese republic, as 
it was the first decisive action ever taken by China in regard to 
foreign affairs. The severance of diplomatic relations came on 
March 14, and after Chang Hsun's attempt to restore the mon- 
archy had been crushed war was declared, again in response to 
the suggestion of the United States, August 14, 19 17. Many 
Chinese laborers were employed in auxiliary service with the Allied 
armies, but China took no important part in the actual fighting. 

America is greatly admired by the Chinese. It has never sought 
territory in China and has stood for the "open door," or the 
equality of all nations in commercial relations with China. It 
gained still further credit by returning the amount of indemnity 
assigned to it after the Boxer troubles of 1900, deducting only 
enough to pay the expenses of its military and naval operations. 
All the other nations that participated in the expedition to Peking 
have retained the full amount of indemnity awarded. Furthermore 
the American republic has been taken as a model for the govern- 
ment of the new China, and the Chinese naturally look to the 
people of America for sympathy and support in their efforts to 
establish a stable democratic government. 

753. The Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). — In 1902 Japan 
had concluded a defensive alliance with Great Britain which greatly 
increased her prestige in the Far East. Two years later she 
declared war on Russia. Respecting the profound cause of this 
conflict, little need be added to what has already been said in 



694 



EUROPEAN EXPANSION 



the preceding paragraphs. Soon after Russia had forced Japan 
to give up Port Arthur and the territory in Manchuria ceded 
to her by the terms of the treaty with China after the Chino- 

Japanese War of 1894 (sec. 750), 
she herself secured from China a 
lease of the most "strategic portion" 
of this same territory, and straight- 
way proceeded to transform Port 
Arthur into a great naval and mili- 
tary fortress, which was to be the 
Gibraltar of the East. Moreover 
she occupied the whole of the great 
Chinese province of Manchuria. 
Notwithstanding she had given her 
solemn pledges that the occupation 
of this territory should be only tem- 
porary, she not only violated these 
pledges but made it evident by her 
acts that she intended, besides mak- 
ing Manchuria a part of the Russian 
Empire, also to seize Korea. But 
Russian control of this stretch of 
seaboard and command of the 
Eastern seas meant that Japan 
would be hemmed in by a perpet- 
ual blockade and her existence as 
an independent nation imperiled. 
It would place her destiny in the 
hands of Russia. Japan could not 
accept this fate. 

She was ready for war; her army and navy were well organ- 
ized, ably commanded, and highly efficient. Hostilities commenced 
in February, 1904. It was the purpose of the Japanese to drive 
the Russians first out of the Liao-tung peninsula and then out of 
Manchuria. Within a few days after the declaration of war the 
two Russian fleets in the eastern waters were severely defeated 




Fig. 1 10. — Field Marshal 
Oyama 

(From stereograph, copyright, 
1904, by the H. C. White Com- 
pany, New York.) 



THE RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR 695 

and bottled up, one at Port Arthur, the other at Vladivostok. 
Japan thus controlled the seas and could transport her troops into 
Korea and Manchuria. General Kuroki marched through Korea 
and defeated the Russians at the Yalu River. General Oku, with 
a second army, had landed just north of Port Arthur, but failed 
to capture that port by assault, and General Nogi, assisted by 
Admiral Togo, was left to conduct a siege. The other armies, 
having united under the command of Marshal Oyama, defeated 
the Russian commander-in-chief, Kuropatkin, who had marched 
to the relief of Port Arthur in September. The Russians retreated 
to Mukden, where from February 25 to March 10, 1905, was 
fought the great battle of the war. The Russians were defeated 
with a loss of about eighty-five thousand men ; the Japanese lost 
about seventy thousand. On January 2, 1905, Port Arthur had 
surrendered after a ten months' siege. 

In an effort to redeem the situation the Russian government had 
sent forth the Baltic fleet under Admiral Rojestvensky in October, 
1904; but this fleet, after the long voyage around the Cape of Good 
Hope, reached the scene of hostilities only to be almost totally de- 
stroyed by Admiral Togo in the Sea of Japan, May 27, 1905. 

Both nations were now desirous of peace. Japan had been 
victorious, but her losses in men had been severe, her war debt 
was heavy, and her resources were limited. Russia, though 
defeated, still had a large army in Manchuria, had apparently 
inexhaustible resources, and occupied positions difficult to attack. 
At the suggestion of President Roosevelt the warring nations sent 
delegates to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Here, after three 
weeks of anxious negotiations, a treaty of peace was signed, 
September 5, 1905. The paramount influence of Japan in Korea 
was recognized ;^® Russia agreed to evacuate Manchuria, and 
ceded to Japan the southern half of the island of Sakhalin and the 
lease of the Liao-tung peninsula, including Port Arthur. Although 
the terms of the treaty were not satisfactory to the Japanese people, 
Japan had gained the immediate objects of the war and had estab- 
lished herself as a world power and a nation to be reckoned with. 

29 In 1 9 10 Japan forcibly annexed Korea, 



696 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

References. — In preparing the following list of books no attempt has 
been made to distinguish between primary and secondary authorities, for 
the reason that so many of the works dealing with the subject of this 
chapter are of a mixed character. 

Works oi a general character: Morris, The History of Colonization. 
Has a good bibliography. Ireland, Tropical Colonization. This also 
contains a list of books relating to the subject. Payne, Etcropean Colonies. 
Reinsch, Colo7iial Governtneyit. KiDD, The Cotitrol of the Tropics. Bryce, 
The Relations of the Advaytced and the Backward Races of Mankind. 

For the British Colonial Empire : Seeley, The Expansion of England. 
Egerton, a Short History of British Colonial Policy. Caldecott, Eng- 
lish Colonization and E77ipire. Bourinot, Canada tuider British Rule, 
jybo-jgoo. ]'E'i:iYiS, History of the Australasian Colonies. 'Ekvci^, Bnpres- 
sions of Sotith Africa. 

For Europe in Africa : Johnston, A History of the Colonization of 
Afi'ica. Stanley, Through the Dark Continent and The Congo and the 
Fotmding of its Free State. Keltie, The Partition of Africa. MiLNER, 
Engla7id z>z Egypt. Hughes, Livi7igstone. Hill, Colo7iel Gordo7t m 
Ce7itral Africa. Cloete, The History of the Great Boer Trek. Cloete 
was the English High Commissioner for Natal in 1843-1844. Paul 
Kruger, Memoirs. De Wet, Three Years'' War. 

For Russia in Asia : Kennan, Siberia a7id the Exile System. Hell- 
WALD, The Russiafis in Central Asia. CuRZON, Russia i7t Ce7itral Asia 
in i88g and the A7iglo-Russia7i Question. CoLQUHOUN, Russia against 
India; the Struggle for Asia. Shoemaker, The Great Siberian Railway. 
Krausse, Russia in Asia. Norman, All the Russias. Skrine, The 
Expansion of Russia, 181^-igoo. HosiE, Manchuria, Its People, Resources, 
and Rece7tt History. 

For the problems of the Far East, created by the European expansion 
movement : Chi7ia's Only Hope, by Chang Chih Tung, Viceroy of Liang Hi. 
This has been pronounced by high authority " one of the most remarkable 
books, if not the most remarkable book, written by a Chinese during the 
past six hundred years." Okakura-Kakuzo, The Awake7ti7tg of Japan. 
Asakawa, The Russo-Japanese Conflict. CuRZON, Problems of the Far 
East. Mkha^, The Problem of Asia. Leroy-Beaulieu, The Awake7iing 
of the East. Colquhoun, China in Tra7isformatio7t and The Mastery of 
the Pacific. Reinsch, World Politics at the End of the Ni7ieteenth Century 
as i7iflue7iced by the Orie7ital Situation. HoRNBECK, Co7itemporary Politics 
in the Far East. Weale, The Fight for the Republic in China. 

Topics for Class Reports. — i. Resume of the history of the lost 
colonial empires of the earlier Modem Age. 2. Livingstone and Stanley. 
3. Founding of the Congo Free State. 4. The Establishment of the Com- 
monwealth of Australia. 5. The storage dam at the First Cataract of the 
Nile. 6. The Cape-to-Cairo Railroad. 7. France in Algeria. 8. Ger- 
many in Western Asia. 9. The Trans-Siberian Railway. 10. Asia for 
the Asiatics. 



CHAPTER XLIV 
THE WORLD STATE 

Unconquerable time itself works on unceasingly, bringing the nations nearer 
to one another, awakening the universal consciousness of the community of man- 
kind ; and this is the natural preparation for a common organization of the world. — 
Bluntschli. 

For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see, 

Saw a Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be"; 

Till the war-drum throbb'd no longer, and the battle-flags were furl'd 
In the ParUament of Man, the Federation of the World. — Tennyson. 

754. Introductory. — In the opening paragraph of his suggestive 
work *'The Expansion of England," Professor Seeley uses these 
words : " It is a favorite maxim of mine that history, while it 
should be scientific in its method, should pursue a practical 
object. That is, it should not merely gratify the reader's curi- 
osity about the past, but modify his view of the present and his 
forecast of the future. Now if this maxim be sound, the history 
of England ought to end with something that might be called 
a moral. Some large conclusion ought to arise out of it; it 
ought to exhibit the general tendency of English affairs in such 
a way as to set us thinking about the future and divining the 
destiny which is reserved for us." 

The inspiring destiny for England which Professor Seeley reads 
in her past and present history is Imperial Federation, that is, 
a great federal union embracing the motherland and her colonies, 
organized after the model of the United States of America. 

Professor Seeley's maxim must needs be applied to universal 
history if its study is to issue in anything really worthy and 
practical. We must try to discover the tendency of the historic 
evolution, to discern the set of the current of world events, and 

697 



698 THE WORLD STATE 

to divine the destiny reserved for the human race. Only thus 
shall we be able to form practical ideals for humanity and strive 
intelligently and hopefully for their realization. 

The destiny of the human race, as plainly disclosed in its past 
history, is not disunion but union, not perpetual warfare but per- 
petual peace. The drift of history from the beginning has been 
toward a federated world, a world organized for common effort 
and common accomplishment. 

755. From the Clan State to the Federal State. — There is no tend- 
ency in universal history, broadly viewed, more manifest than this 
tendency toward world unity. In the beginning the largest inde- 
pendent group was the clan or tribe. Then came the wider union of 
the city-state as we find it in Babylonia and Syria, and in Greece and 
Italy, at the dawn of history. For upwards of two thousand years 
the city-state was the ultimate political unit in the civilized world 
of the Mediterranean. Then, — if we disregard purely artificial 
unions, unions created and maintained by force, such as the Roman 
Empire, — then came the nation states of modern times, which, 
since the break-up of the Roman Empire, have been slowly created 
through the consolidation of tribes, cities, and petty principalities. 

And just now among these great nation states a state of a new 
type has arisen, — the federal state, of which our Union, consist- 
ing of forty-eight states, is the model. Constituted " in the image 
and likeness " of this are the Dominion of Canada, the Common- 
wealth of Australia, the Swiss Confederation, and the new Slav 
republics. So characteristic a feature, indeed, of the political life 
of the present is this federation movement, that ours has been 
called the Federal Age. " One of the most striking tendencies of 
the last century," writes Professor Albert Bushnell Hart, *' has 
been the developinent of federal government in Europe and 
America." "The aspect of the whole world," writes Parkin, the 
author of Imperial Federation, " irresistibly suggests the thought 
that we are passing from a nation epoch to a federation epoch." 

The significant thing about this federal movement is that the 
natural and logical issue of national federalism is international 
federalism. The United States of America foreshadows the 



PREREQUISITE OF THE WORLD UNION 699 

United States of Europe. The obstacles in the way of such a 
federation of the European nations are not so great as those 
which, scarcely more than a generation ago, seemed to render 
chimerical all attempts to build up unified nations out of the 
discordant elements existing in Italy and in Germany. The crea- 
tion of the United States of Europe is a light task compared with 
the creation of the modern European nations out of the mediaeval 
chaos of warring tribes, cities, and feudal principalities. To doubt 
that the work of organization, so far advanced, will stop short of 
full accomplishment in the formation of the larger European union, 
which alone can give real worth and meaning to the narrower 
national unions, is to doubt that the great tendencies in history 
are toward any ascertainable and reasonable goal. 

756. Preparations in Different Domains for the World State. — 
The success which has attended the application of the federal 
principle to wide unions of states, like that of the United States, 
creates a reasonable hope that the same principle will be found 
capable of uniting in a great federation all the nations of the 
earth. And, in truth, during the last century, in different realms, 
the prerequisites of such a world union have been supplied by 
humanity's advance and achievements. 

In the political realm all that the age-spirit has accomplished 
would seem to have for its ultimate aim the preparing of the way 
for international federation. More than a century ago Immanuel 
Kant, in his essay on Perpetual Peace, affirmed that a prerequisite 
for the federation of the world was the establishment by all the 
nations of representative government. If we recall what the union 
of the autocratic governments of Europe in the Holy Alliance 
meant (sec. 647), we shall understand why Kant made the estab- 
lishment of free popular institutions within the different nations 
an indispensable prerequisite of the world union. A world union 
of despotic governments would be the tomb of liberty, individual 
and national, — a world-wide autocratic despotism. 

When Kant wrote his plea for peace, autocratic government 
prevailed almost everywhere in Europe; in England alone was 
there the semblance of a representative constitution. We have 



7CX) THE WORLD STATE 

seen how, during the century which has passed since then, the 
Political Revolution has established representative government 
in most of the Christian states of Europe. Furthermore, in all 
the really vital nations and communities outside of Europe, — 
in the United States, in Canada, in Australia, in Japan, — the 
management of public affairs is in the hands of the people. Thus 
has the first prerequisite of the formation of the universal state 
been supplied in the case of almost all the great nations and 
communities of the civilized world. 

A second significant preparation in the political realm for the 
world union is federalism. This supplies the principle which 
may be applied to the organization of the world without danger 
to the principle of local autonomy and legitimate national free- 
dom ; for it deprives the uniting states, as exemplified in our own 
Union, of nothing save that "lawless freedom" which they now 
use to do one another hurt and harm. 

While the basis of a world state has thus been laid in the 
political domain through the incoming of democracy and feder- 
alism, an equally important preparation for the permanent organ- 
ization of the world has been made in the moral realni. Throughout 
the last century the sentiment of the brotherhood of man has been 
vastly deepened and strengthened. There has been growing up, 
too, a new social conscience which recognizes the universality of 
the moral law, which recognizes that it is a law as binding upon 
nations as upon individuals. These new moral feelings constitute 
a force which is working irresistibly in the interest of a world 
union based on international amity and good will. 

It is most significant that at the same time that these move- 
ments towards world unity have characterized progress in the 
political and moral realms, wonderful discoveries, inventions, and 
developments in the physical domain, — the steam railway, the 
steamship, the telegraph, the telephone, wireless telegraphy, and a 
hundred others, — through the practical annihilation of time and 
space, have brought the once isolated nations close alongside one 
another and have made easily possible, in truth, made necessary 
and inevitable, the formation of the world union. 



PEACE CONFERENCE AT THE HAGUE 701 

757. The Interparliamentary Union. — One of the most impor- 
tant of the agencies at work for international organization is what 
is known as the Interparliamentary Union. This is an association 
made up exclusively of members of national legislatures or parlia- 
ments. Its membership now numbers more than two thousand. 
Because of the noble character of the men composing this inter- 
national society, as well as because of their connection with the 
practical work of legislation in the different states, this body is 
the most influential of the agencies now working for the organiza- 
tion of the world. 

758. The International Peace Conference at The Hague and the 
Establishment of the International Court of Arbitration (1899). — 
Already more has been accomplished in the way of the actual 
creation of the machinery of a world state than is generally 
realized. Just as the nineteenth century was closing the Tsar 
Nicholas surprised the world by proposing to all the governments 
having representatives at the Russian court the meeting of a con- 
ference *' to consider means of insuring the general peace of the 
world and of putting a limit to' the progressive increase of arma- 
ments which weigh upon all nations." 

All the governments addressed accepted the proposal, and in 
1899 the Convention met at The Hague in the Netherlands. The 
most important outcome of the deliberations of the body was the 
estabhshment of a permanent International Court of Arbitration 
to which all nations may have recourse for the settlement of 
interstate disputes. 

The formation of this International Court is a most noteworthy 
event. In the words of a recent writer, " It may be possible that 
looking back a hundred years from now it will be seen that its 
establishment was the most important single event of modern 
times." Andrew Carnegie, recognizing the import of the work 
of the Convention for the peace of the world, has made a gift of 
^1,500,000 for the erection at The Hague of a permanent home 
for the Court, —what is to be known as " The Temple of Peace." 

The first two cases to be submitted to the Court were the 
Pious Fund case, between the United States and Mexico, and 



702 



THE WORLD STATE 



the Venezuela case, which concerned thirteen nations. Both of 
these cases were amicably settled.^ Referring, in an official 
message to the decision of the Court in the latter case, 

President Roosevelt used 
these words: "This triumph 
of the principle of interna- 
tional arbitration is a sub- 
ject of warm congratulation, 
and offers a happy augury for 
the peace of the world." Many 
of the leading nations have 
already bound themselves by 
treaties to refer to the Court 
all controversies of a speci- 
fied character arising between 
them. 

The creation of this Inter- 
national Court of Arbitration 
brings measurably nearer the 
time when the barbarous wager 
of battle between nations shall 
have become such a tradition 
of an outgrown past as is now 
the old wager of battle between 
FiG.iii. — :TheChristoftheAndes2 individuals (sec. 47). 

(From a photograph by Carolina tj^g Meeting of the Second 

^^ ° ^°^ International Conference and 

the Proposed Creation of a Stated World Congress or Parliament. — 

A Supreme Court of the nations having been established, the next 

1 Many other cases have been referred to this Court, and several have been 
satisfactorily adjudicated. 

2 In 1903 the South American republics of Chile and Argentina, having happily 
settled by arbitration a long-standing boundary controversy which threatened to in- 
volve the two countries in war, mutually bound themselves by treaty to reduce their 
miUtary and naval armaments and for a stated period to submit every matter of dis- 
pute arising between them to arbitration. Upon one of the highest boundary ranges 
of the Andes the two nations have erected a colossal bronze statue of Christ as the 
sacred guardian of the peace to which they are pledged. The statue was unveiled 
March 13, 1904. 




PROPOSED INTERNATIONAL PARLIAMENT 703 

step in the organization of the world is the formation of an Inter- 
national Legislature. This step has already been taken. The 
Interparliamentary Union, at its meeting held at St. Louis in the 
fall of 1904, passed a resolution requesting the governments of 
the different nations to send representatives to a second interna- 
tional conference, and asking that at such conference there be 
considered among other matters "the advisability of establishing 
an International Congress to convene periodically for the discus- 
sion of international questions." 

The President of the United States was requested by the Union 
to invite the governments of the world to send delegates to such 
a conference. He at once complied with the request. The invita- 
tions met with cordial responses from the governments addressed, 
and what is known as the Second Hague Conference met in 
1907. Forty-four of the fifty and more sovereign and independ- 
ent nations of the world were represented. One of the important 
achievements of the conference was the adoption of a proposal 
made by the delegates of the United States for the establishment 
of an International Court of Arbitral Justice, as a genuine court of 
law with permanent judges, to stand by the side of the Court of 
Arbitration created by the First Hague Conference. The juris- 
diction and rules of procedure of the court were agreed upon, but 
unfortunately no agreement as to the number and mode of selec- 
tion of the judges could be reached. Had the court been fully 
constituted and the submission to it of international disputes been 
made obligatory, it is possible that the great tragedy which over- 
whelmed Europe in 1 9 1 4 would have been averted. 

The action of the conference respecting the periodic meeting of 
representatives of the nations was as follows : " The conference 
recommends to the powers the reunion of a third peace confer- 
ence, which shall take place within a period analogous to that 
which has elapsed since the preceding conference, at a date fixed 
by common agreement among the powers." There is justification 
for the confident hope that a third conference will be convened at 
The Hague very soon after the end of the present world war. 



704 THE WORLD STATE 

References. — Bluntschli, The Theory of the State, bk. i, chap. ii. 
Seeley, The Expansio7i of England. Y^K^T, Perpetual Peace. Jean DE 
Bloch, The Future of War, being the sixth volume of the author's 
extended work under this same title. Parkin, Imperial Federation. 
Trueblood, The Federation of the World. Mead, A Primer of the 
Peace Movement. Hart, An Introduction to the Study of Federal Govern- 
ment. FiSKE, American Political Ideas. SuMNER, Addresses on War. 
Foster, Arbitration and The Hague Court. HoLLS, The Peace Conference 
at The Hague. ToLSTOl, War and Peace, and Letter 07i the Russo- 
Japanese War. Baroness von Suttner, Lay Down Your Arms. 



CONCLUSION 
THE NEW AGE: INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 

760. The Age of Material Progress or the Industrial Age. — 
History has been well likened to a grand dissolving view. While 
one age is passing away another is coming into prominence. 
Before the movement in the poHtical realm which we have been 
following, and which is creating free self -directing nations and 
organizing them in a world-wide union, has yet reached its con- 
summation, the scene is already shifting. During the last hundred 
years the features of a new age have distinctly appeared. A new 
movement of human society has begun. Civilization has fairly 
entered upon what may be called the Industrial Age or the Age 
of Material Progress. 

We have already noted the beginnings' of this new age in the 
industrial revolution effected by the great inventions which marked 
the latter part of the eighteenth century (sec. 544)- In the decade 
between 1830 and 1840 the industrial development thus initiated 
received a great impulse through the bringing to practical perfec- 
tion of several of the earlier inventions and by new discoveries 
and fresh inventions. Prominent among these were the steam 
railway, the electric telegraph, and the ocean steamship. In the 
year 1830 Stephenson exhibited the first really successful loco- 
motive. In 1836 Morse perfected the telegraph. In 1838 ocean 
steamship navigation was first practically solved.-^ 

These and other inventions which have grown out of them have 
brought about momentous changes in the social and the political 

1 These inventions may be compared, in their relations to the new industrial age, 
to the three great inventions or discoveries, namely, printing, gunpowder, and the 
mariner's compass, which ushered in the Modern Age (see p. 290). 

705 



7o6 CONCLUSION 

world.'^ But it is only the revolution which they have wrought in the 
industrial domain to which we would now direct attention. And the 
significant fact for us here to note is that through the application 
of these inventions to the processes of manufacture and to the 
thousand other industries and activities of mankind the productive 
forces of society have been almost incalculably increased. Prob- 
ably more things contributive to human well-being can now be 
produced in a single day than were produced in ten or twenty 
days at the opening of the century. In some important branches 
of manufacture the productive power of the workman, aided by 
machinery, has been increased a hundred and even a thousand 
fold. 

The history of this age of industry, so different from any pre- 
ceding age, cannot yet be written, for no one can tell whether 
the epoch is just opening or is already well advanced.^ We shall 
have finished the task set ourselves when we have merely stated 
the leading problem which this remarkable industrial develop- 
ment has created, and indicated the solution of that problem 
which the Socialists have proposed. 

761. The Labor Problem. — Beyond controversy the great prob- 
lem of the epoch, one involving many others, is the so-called 
Labor Problem. This, plainly stated, is. How are the products 
of the world's industry to be equitably distributed? 

The condition of things is this. Through the employment 
of the forces of nature and the use of improved machinery, 



2 Thus, for illustration, the increased facilities for travel, by bringing men together 
and familiarizing them with new scenes and different forms of society and belief, are 
making them more liberal and tolerant. Still again, by the virtual annihilation of 
time and space, governmental problems are being solved. As we have just seen, a 
chief difficulty in maintaining a federation of states widely separated has already 
been removed and such extended territories as those of the United States have been 
made practically as compact as the m.ost closely consolidated European state. 

3 It may well be that we have already seen the greatest surprises of the age, so far 
as great inventions and discoveries are concerned, and that the epoch is nearing its 
culmination. " It is probable," says Professor Richard T. Ely, " that as we, after more 
than two thousand years, look back upon the time of Pericles with wonder and aston- 
ishment, as an epoch great in art and literature, posterity two thousand years hence 
will regard our era as forming an admirable and unparalleled epoch in the history of 
industrial invention." — French and German Socialism in Modern Times. 



SOCIALISM OR SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 707 

economic goods, that is, products adapted to meet the physical 
wants of men, can be produced in almost unlimited quantities. 
But this increase in society's productive power has brought little 
or no corresponding augmentation of material well-being to the 
laboring classes. Owing to some defect in our industrial system 
a few secure a disproportionate share of its benefits.'* Great 
monopolies or trusts are created and fabulous fortunes are amassed 
by a few fortunate individuals, while perhaps the majority of the 
laborers for wages, with their toil lightened comparatively little 
or not at all, receive almost nothing beyond the means of narrow 
and bare subsistence. 

This inequitable distribution of wealth, of material well-being, 
this practical exclusion of the masses from the greater part of 
the benefits and enjoyments of modern civilization, is creating 
everywhere the most dangerous discontent among the laboring 
classes and is awakening among philanthropists and statesmen 
the greatest solicitude and apprehension. 

762. Socialism or Social Democracy. — The proposed solution 
of the problem which has awakened most thought and created 
most debate is that offered by the Socialists, or Social Democrats. 
Just as our own government — state, city, or national — now owns 
schoolhouses and controls education, owns and conducts the post 
office, municipal water works, and other public utilities, so would 
the Socialists have the government by the gradual extension of 
its functions come into possession of the railways, the telegraph,^ 
the mines, mills, factories, the land, — in a word, of all the means 
of production, of all those things upon which or in connection 
with which human labor is spent in order to satisfy human wants 
and to meet human desires. 

4 According to a recent estimate 125,000 families of the wealthy class in the United 
States hold $33,000,000,000 of the total wealth of the nation, while 5,500,000 families 
of the poorer class possess only |8oo,ooo,ooo. To put it in another way, in every one 
hundred families of the nation one family holds more than the remaining ninety-nine. 
Nearly half the families of the nation are classed as " propertyless," that is, as having 
nothing save clothing and household furniture. See Spahr, An Essay on the Present 
Distribution of Wealth in the United States (1896), p. 69. 

5 In many of the countries of Europe the railways and the telegraph are already 
largely in the hands of the government. 



708 CONCLUSION 

The Socialists maintain that only under such a system as this 
— which would do away with the wage system and with private 
capital, though not with private property — can the present 
exploitation of labor by capital be made impossible and every 
man secured reasonable participation in the benefits of the gifts 
of nature and of the new inventions and discoveries which are 
rendering nature with all her mighty forces man's willing servant. 

Socialists lay great emphasis on this, namely, that what they 
propose is in line and harmony with the great historic move- 
ments of the past centuries. They maintain that the democra- 
tization of wealth® is the logical issue of the democratization of. 
knowledge, of religion, and of government by the Renaissance, 
the Reformation, and the Political Revolution. For them the 
coming Industrial Revolution^ is the next and necessary phase 
of the progressive course of civilization. 

6 It should ba carefully noted that democracy in wealth does not mean commimism, 
which denies individual rights in property, any more than democracy in religion 
means atheism, or democracy in politics, anarchy. It simply looks to such a reform 
of the present economic system as shall secure to every man an equitable proportion 
of the material goods which his labor helps to create, or " an apportionment of well 
being according to labor performed." 

'!' It will be noted that to the term " Industrial Revolution " as used by the Social- 
ists there attaches a wholly different meaning from that which it carries when used 
by the political economists (sec. 544). What the latter call the "Industrial Revolu- 
tion" is to the SociaUst only an antecedent of the real Revolution, which is still 
to come. 



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Filmer, Sir R., Patriarcha (Morley's Universal Library). London, Routledge. 

1887. 
First Principles of the Reformation. Ed. by Wace and Buchheim. Phila., 

Lutheran Publication Society. 1885. 
First Three English Books on America, The. Ed. by Edward Arber. 

Birmingham, Eng., i Montague Road. 1885. 
Forbes, A., My Experience of the War between France and Germany, 2 vols. 

London, Hurst. 1871. 
Ford, C, The Life and Letters of Madame de Kriidener. London, Black. 

1893. 
Froissart, Sir John, Chronicles. Ed. for boys by S. Lanier. N.Y., Scribner. 

1884. 
Hamley, E. B., The Story of the Campaign. Boston, Guild & Lincoln. 1855. 
Heimskringla, The, or Chronicle of the Kings of Norway, 4 vols. Trans, by 

Samuel Laing. Rev. ed. N.Y., Scribner. 1889. 
Henderson, E. F., Select Historical Documents of the Middle Ages. London, 

Bell. 1892. 
Side Lights on English History. N.Y., Holt. 1900. • 



GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY 723 

Herberstein, Sigismund von, Notes upon Russia. Hakluyt Society Publica- 
tions. 
Hill, M., Liberty Documents. London, Longmans. 1901. 
Historical Leaflets. Crozer Theological Seminary, Chester, Penn. 
Historical Sources in Schools. Report to the New England History 

Teachers' Association by a select committee. N.Y., Macmillan. 1902. 
Holls, F. W., The Peace Conference at The Hague. N.Y., Macmillan. 1900. 
Jones, G., Studies in European History (Civilization in the Middle Ages). 

Chicago, Ainsworth. 1900. 
Journal of Christopher Columbus^ The. Ed. by C. R. Markham. Hakluyt 

Society Publications. 
Kendall, E. K., Source-Book of English History. N.Y., Macmillan. 1900. 
Koran [Qur'an], 2 vols. Trans, by Palmer. Oxford, Clarendon Press. 1880. 
Kriiger, Paul. Memoirs. N.Y., Century Co. 1902. 
Law of Free Monarchies^ by King James. In his Works. London, 

Montague. 1616. 
Lee, G. C, Source- Book of English History. NY., Holt. 1900. 
Mabie, H. W., Norse Stories, retold from the Eddas. N.Y., Dodd. 1901. 
Mazzini, J., Life and Writi7igs, 6 vols. New ed. London, Smith & Elder. 

1890, 1891. 
Mettemich, Prince, Memoirs, 5 vols. Trans, by Mrs. Alexander Napier. 

N.Y., Scribner. 1880. 
Milton, J., The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. In vol. ii o£ his prose 

works (Bohn). London, Macmillan. 1890-1901. 
Mirror of Perfection, The. Ed. by Paul Sabatier. Boston, Page. 1900. 
Moltke, Graf von, The Franco-German War, 1870-1871. Trans, by Bell 

and Fisher, N.Y., Harper. 1892. 
More, Sir Thomas, Utopia (Morley's Universal Library). London, Rout- 
ledge. 1889. 
Old South Leaflets, 6 vols, Boston, Directors of the Old South Work, 

Old South Meeting House. 1896-1904. 
Payne, E. J., Voyages of the Elizabethan Seamen to America. 2d ed. 

Oxford, Clarendon Press. 1893. 
Robinson, J. H., Readings in European History, 2 vols. Boston, Ginn. 

1904. Our references to this work are uniformly to the first volume. 

The second volume has not yet (February, 1905) appeared. 
Robinson, J. H., and Rolfe, H. W., Petrarch. N.Y., Putnam. 1898. 
Saint-Simon, Duke of. Memoirs, 4 vols. Trans, by Bayle St. John. N.Y., 

Pott. 1901. 
Sevigne, Madame de, Letters (selection), Chicago, McClurg. 1890. 
Speeches and Table-Talk of the Prophet Mohammed. Trans, by Stanley 

Lane-Poole. London, Macmillan. 1882. 
Stanley, H. M., The Congo and the Founding of its Free State, 2 vols. 

N.Y., Harper. 1885. 
Story of Burnt Njal, The. Trans, by George W. Dasent. N.Y., Dutton. 

1900. 
Sully, Duke of. Memoirs, 4 vols. London, Bell. 1877. 
Tarbell, I. M., The Words of Napoleon (Day's Work Series). Boston. 1900. 
Translations and Reprints. Department of History of the University of Penn, 
Whitcomb, M., A Literary Source-Book of the Italian Renaissance. Part I, 

The Italian Renaissance ; Part II, The German Renaissance, Depart- 
ment of History of the University of Penn, 1900. 
Wilhelmina, Frederica Sophia, Memoirs, 2 vols. Boston, Osgood, 1877. 
Young, Arthur, Travels in France. London, Bell. 1890. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Note. — In the case of words whose correct pronunciation has not 
seemed to be clearly indicated by their accentuation and syllabication, the 
sounds of the letters have been denoted thus: a, like a in gray ; a, like a, 
only less prolonged; a, like a in have ; a, like« in far ; a, like a in all ; e, 
like ee in meet ; e, like e, only less prolonged; e, like e in ettd ; e, like e in 
there; e, like ^ in err ; i, like tin pine ; i, like iin pm ; o, like o in note; 
6, like 0, only less prolonged; 6, like o in not ; 6, like a in ^r^; oo, like oo 
in »2^?? ; ii, like ?^ in use ; ii, like the French u ; £. and ch, like k ; 9, like j ; 
g, like <^ in ^^/; g, like// s, like z ; ch, as in German ach; G, small capi- 
tal, as in German Hamburg; n, like ni in minion; n denotes the nasal 
sound in French, being similar to ng in song. 



Aachen (a'ken), 67. 

Abbassides (ab-basldz), dynasty of 

the, 55. 
Ab'e-lard, Peter, 193, 194. 
Abu Bekr (a'boo bek'r), first caliph, 

52 n. 6. 
Abukir Bay (a-boo-ker'), battle of, 

540. 
Ab-ys-sin'i-a, 679 n. 19. 
Acre (a^ker), siege of, by crusaders, 

135 ; by Bonaparte, 540. 
Addison, Joseph, 483. 
Ad-ri-an-6'ple, Treaty of, 655. 
Afghan War, first, 672 ; second, 672 

n. II. 
Af-ghan-is-tan', 672 n. 11. 
A-fra-si-ab', Persian legendary hero, 

167 n. 5. 
Africa, Portuguese exploration of, 

278 ; Stanley in, 667 ; partition of, 

669; English in, 674-678; French 

in, 678, 679; Germans in, 681. 
Africa, North, recovery of, by Jus- 
tinian, 9 ; conquest of, by the 

Arabs, 52, 53. 
Agincourt (a'zhan-koor''), battle of, 
.. 212, 213. 
A'gra, 162. 
Aids, feudal, 83. 
Aix-la-Chapelle (aks-la-sha-pel') 

(Ger. Aachen), Treaty of (1668), 

407; (1748), 474- 



Albert, archbishop of Mainz, 301. 
Albert of Brandenburg, 307. 
Albert, duke of Austria, 240. 
Albert the Great, Schoolman, 194. 
Albi (al-beO> 142 n. 11. 
Arbi-gen'^ses, crusades against, 142, 

143- 
Al^boin, king of Lombards, 10 n. 5. 
Albuquerque (al-boo-ker'ki), 281 n. 

3- 

Alcuin (alTcwin), 67. ^ . 

Aldine Press, at Venice, 264. 

Ardus Ma-nu'ti-us, 264. 

Alembert, d' (a-16n-bar'), 507. 

Alexander I, Tsar, at Tilsit, 558- 
560 ; at Erfurt, 565 ; war with 
Napoleon, 573-575 ; in Holy Alli- 
ance, 586 ; as liberal and as reac- 
tionist, 654 ; II, emancipates serfs, 
657, 658; assassinated, 662; III, 
662. 

Alexius Com-ne'nus I, Greek em- 
peror, asks aid of the Latins 
against the Turks, 130. 

Alfred the Great, king of England, 
74 n. 2. 

Algeria, 678, 679. 

Ali (a'le), caliph, 52 n. 6. 

Almansur (al-man-soor'), caliph, 

55- 
Alphonso, king of Castile, emperor- 
elect H. R. E., 237. 



725 



^26 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Al-sace' (Ger. Elsass), ceded to 
France, 392; to Germany, 595; 
question of, in France, 596, 646, 

^647. 

AFva, duke of, in Netherlands, 

366, 367. 
Amalfi (a-marfe), 103. 
America, discovered by Northmen, 

73- 

Amiens (a-me-an'). Treaty of, 545, 
546; broken, 553. 

Amurath (a-moo-rat') I, Turkish 
sultan, 165. 

Anabaptists, 307 n. 10. 

Anagni (a-nan'ye), 154. 

An-a-to'li-a, 164. 

An-a-t5'li-an Railway, 681. 

Anchorites. See Hermits. 

Anglo-Saxons, conquest of Britain, 
12. See England. 

An-go'ra, battle of, 166. 

Anjou (oii'zhoo), French province, 
202. 

Annates, 303 n. 5; Act of, 341. 

Anne of Austria, 404. 

Anne of Cleves, 345. 

Anne, queen of England, 480-483. 

Antioch, taken by crusaders, 132. 

Antony of Bourbon, king of Na- 
varre, -yi-]. 

Antwerp, Spanish fury at, 369. 

Appeals, Act in Restraint of, 341. 

A-qufnas, Thomas, 194, 195. 

Arabian Nights, 57. 

Arabic system of notation, 58. 

Arabs, origin and character, 46; 
religious condition before Mo- 
hammed, 46-48. See Saracens 
and Moors. 

Aragon, union with Castile, 230. 

Archaeology, science of, created by 
classical revival, 272. 

Architecture, mediaeval, 183. 

Ar-€o'la, battle of, 538 n. 2. 

Aristotle, quoted, 183 n. 11. 

Arkwright, 494 n. 19. 

Ar-ma'da, Invincible, 356-359. 

Amdt, 571. 

Arthur, King, 12. 

Arthur, Prince of Wales, 336. 

Articles of Religion, Anglican, 348. 

Artois (ar-twa'), ceded to France, 

.. 404- 

As'pem, battle of, 566. 



Assassination, political, 341 n. 5. 
' Assiento " (as-e-en'to), the, 481. 
Assignats (as'ig-nats; Fr. pron. 

a-se-na'), 518 n. 11. 
Assisi (a-se'se), 151. 
Assizes of Jerusalem, 133. 
Assuan (as-swan^), 678. 
As-tra-khan', 454. 
As-tu'ri-as, the, 229. 
Atahualpa (a-ta-warpa), 288. 
Athanasius (ath-a-na'shi-us), 23. 
A'thens, dukedom of, 137. 
Attainder, bill of, 345 n. 5. 
Attila, legend of, 29 n. 12. 
Auerstadt (ou'er-stet), battle of, 

558. 
Augsburg, Diet of, 308 ; Confession 

of, 308 ; Religious Peace of, 324 ; 

League of, 410, 411. 
Au'gus-tlne, his mission to Britain, 
' 16. 

Augustus the Strong, 463. 
Ausgleich (ous'glTch), 650. 
Austerlitz (ous'ter-lits), battle of, 

555- 

Australasia, 671 n. 9. 

AustraUa, 671; Commonwealth of, 
671. 

Austria (Ger. CEsterreich), House 
of, 238 n. 19; imperial crown be- 
comes hereditary in, 240; under 
Charles V, 318; under Maria The- 
resa, 473-476; under Joseph II, 
497-499; wars against French 
Revolution, 520, 537-539; wars 
against Napoleon, 545, 554, 555, 
566, 576; empire of, 556; gains 
at Congress of Vienna, 583 ; in 
Holy Alliance, 586; Italian in- 
terests of, 619-629 ; German in- 
terests of, 634-642 ; in Austro- 
Hungarian monarchy, 650-653. 

Austria-Hungary since 1866, 650- 

653- 
Austrian Succession, War of, 472- 

474 ; England in, 486. 
Austro-Prussian War, 641, 642. 
Austro-Sardinian War, 626, 627. 
Auto de fe (a'to-da-fa"), the, 232; 
^ at Valladoli'd, 365. 
A'vars, subdued by Charlemagne, 

63. 
Avignon (a'ven'yon'''), removal of 

papal seat to, 155. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 727 



A'von, river, 219. 

A'zov, Russians capture, 458. 

Aztecs, 287. 

Ba'ber, founder of Mongol state in 

India, 162. 
Bacon, Roger, 195, 196. 
Bagdad, founded, 55. 
Baj-a-zet' or Baj'a-zet I, 165, 166. 
Bal-b5'a, Vasco de, 286 n, 11. 
Baldwin of Flanders, Latin emperor 

of the East, 137. 
Balliol (bal'i-ol), John, Scottish 

king, 206, 207. 
Ban'nock-bum'', battle of, 208. 
Bar-ba-ross'a, bey of Algiers, 322 

n. 5. 
Barebone, Praise-God, 437. 
Bar'ne-veid, John of, 374 n. 8. 
Barras (ba-ras'), 536 n. 25. 
Ba'sel, Church Council of, 157. 
Ba'sel (Fr. Bale), treaties of, 537 n. 

Bastille (bas-teF), storming of the, 

Batavian Republic (this had been 
created in 1795), made into king- 
dom of Holland, 552. 

Batu (ba'too'O' Mongol leader, 161, 
162. 

Bautzen (bout'sen), battle of, 576. 

Bavaria (Ger. Bayem), kingdom, 
556; in German Empire, 646. 

Bay'ard (Fr. pron. ba-yar'), Cheva- 
lier, 321. 

Baylen (bi-len'), capitulation of, 
564 n. 21. 

Ba-zaine', Marshal, 595. 

Becket. See Thomas Becket. 

Bede (bed), the Venerable, 20 n. 5. 

Bedouins (bed'00-enz), the, 46. 

"Beggars," origin of name, 365; 
"water beggars," 369. 

Begging friars. See Mendicant 
friars. 

Belgium (Fr. Belgique), war of 
Louis X IV concerning, 407 ; 
ceded to Austria, 413 ; revolution 
in, 498; ceded to France, 538; 
in kingdom of Netherlands, 583 ; 
independent kingdom, 591. 

Bel-i-sa'ri-us, general, 9. 

Bel-ley o-phon, the, 578. 

Benares (be-na'rez), 122. 



Ben'der Ab^bas, 683. 

Benedetti (ba-na-det'te), 644. 

Benedictines, order of the, 25. 

Ben'e-fic''t-um, the, 80. 

Benevolences, 335. 

Beowulf (ba'o-wuif), Saxon poem, 19. 

Beresina (ber-e-ze'na), 575. 

Ber'gen, 174. 

Ber-lin' (Ger. pron. ber-len'). Decree, 
561 ; Treaty of, 660. 

Bemadotte (ber^na-dot), king of. 
Sweden, 583 n. 3. 

Bes-sa-ra'bi-a, ceded to Russia, 660. 

Beust (boist). Count, 650. 

Bible, Luther's, 306; King James', 
424. 

Bishops' War, 427, 428. 

Bis'marck, Otto von, 639-649. 

Black Death, the, 210; effect on 
wages in England, 211, 

Black Hole of Calcutta, 490 n. 14. 

Black Prince, the, 211. 

Blenheim (blen'im), battle of, 412. 

"Bloody Assizes," the, 447 n. 16. 

Bliich'er, 578. 

Blues and Greens, factions at Con- 
stantinople, 43. 

Boccaccio (bok-kat'cho), his Decam- 
eron, 259; as a humanist, 259. 

Boers (boors), the, 674-676. 

Bo-e'thi-us, 8. 

Bohemia, in Thirty Years' War, 387, 
388. 

Bo'he-mond, prince of Otranto, 132. 

Boleyn, Anne (boorin), 339, 341 ; 
marriage, 341 ; death^345. 

Bolingbroke (boring-brook), 505 n.5. 

Bologna (bo-lon'ya), University of, 
188. 

Bonaparte. See Jerome, Joseph, 
Louis, Napoleon. 

Boniface (bon'e-fass) VIII pro- 
claims jubilee, 300. 

B5'ra, Catherine von, 304 n. 6. 

Bordeaux (bor-do'), 533- 

Borodino (bor-o-de'no), battle of, 

574- 

Borromeo (bor-ro-ma'o). Carlo, 311. 

Bo-rus'si, the, 469. 

Bos'ni-a, revolt in, 659; adminis- 
tered by Austria-Hungary, 660. 

Bos'po-rus, the, 53. 

Bossuet (bo-su-a'), 398, 417 n. 14 

Bosworth Field, battle of, 215. 



728 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Botany Bay, 671. 

Boulogne (boo-lon'), camp of, 554. 

Bour'bon, Cardinal, 381. 

Bourbon, House of, accession in 
France, 381; in Spain, 411; re- 
stored in France, 576 ; in Naples, 
582 ; heirs expelled from France, 
597; in Spain, 614. 

Bourgeoisie (boor-zhwa-ze'), 503. 

Boyne, battle of the, 452. 

Braddock, 489 n. 11. 

Bradshaw, 443. 

Bra-gan'za, House of, in Portugal, 

Brandenburg, electorate of, under 

the Hohenzollerns, 469. 
Brant, Sebastian, 297 n. i. 
Brazil, falls to Portugal, 281 n. 5; 

Portuguese royal family flee to, 

615 n. 2; empire of, 615 n. 2; 

republic of, 615 n. 2. 
Breitenfeld (brf ten-felt), battle of, 

390- 
Brethren of the Common Life, 297. 
Bretigny (bre-ten-yf). Treaty of, 

211 n. 9. 
Briel (brel), 368, 369. 
Bright, John, 602 n. i. 
Britain, Anglo-Saxon conquest of, 

12. See England. 
British Empire in India, 672, 673. 
Brittany, origin of name, 1 2 n. 6. 
Bruce, Robert, king of Scotland, 

207, 208. 
Bru'ges (Fr. pron. briizh), 174. 
Bru-maire', Revolution of, 540, 541. 
Brunelleschi (broo-nel-les'ke), 267 

n. 10. 
Brunswick, Duke of, 521 ; House of, 

484 n. 5. 
Budapest, 650. 
Bulgaria, 660 n. 8. 
Bunyan, John, 443. 
Burghley, Lord, 352, 
Burgundians, kingdom of the, 9. 
Bur'gun-dy, origin of name, 9, 
Butler, Samuel, 450. 
Byron, Lord, 654 n. i. 
Byzantine Empire. See Eastern 

Empire. 

Cabinet, English, 485. 
Cab'ot, John, 337. 
Cabot, Sebastian, 337. 



Ca'diz, 359. 

Caed'mon, poet-monk, 20. 
Caen (koh), 526. 
Cahiers (ka-ya'), 510. 
Cairo, 58 ; Bonaparte in, 399, 
Caj'e-tan, Cardinal, 303 n. 4. 
Calais (kal'lss), captured by Eng- 
lish, 210; English lose, 351. 
Calcutta, Black Hole of, 490 n. 14. 
Calendar, French Revolutionary, 

529- 
Caliphate of Bagdad, established, 

55 ; Golden Age of, 55 ; dismem- 
berment of, 55, 56. 
Calmar, Union of, 249. 
Calvin, John, at Geneva, 309 n. 13; 

bums Servetus, 312. 
Calvinists, 309 ; omitted from Peace 

of Augsburg, 324 n. 7. 
Cam-ba-lu', Mongol capital, 162. 
Cam-bo'di-a, 679. 

Cambronne (koh-bron'), 578 n. 30. 
Campagna (kam-pan'ya), 632. 
Campo Formio (kam-po-for'me-o), 

Treaty of, 538. 
Canada, under Louis XIV, 413, 414 ; 

ceded to England, 419; Domin- 
ion of, 670. 
Ca-nos^sa, Henry IV's humiliation 

at, 118. 
Can-ta'bri-a, 229. 
Ca-nute', king of England, 75. 
Cape Colony, 674. 
Ca'pet, Hugh, king of France, 220, 

221. 
Capetians. See France. 
Cape-to-Cairo Railway, 676. 
Capitularies of Charlemagne, 66. 
Car-bo-na'ri, 620. 
Cardinals, Sacred College of, 113 

n. 4. 
Carloman, king of Franks, 62. 
Carl'stadt, 306. 
Car-nar'von, castle, 205, 206. 
Carnegie (car-na'gie), Andrew, 701. 
Car-ni-5'la, 566. 

Carnot (kar-n5'), Sadi, 596 n. 10. 
Car-o-lin'gi-an family, beginning of, 

62 ; its extinction, 69. 
Carrier (kar-ya'), 534. 
Carroccio (car-rot'cho), the, 177 n. 3. 
Cartwright, 494. 
Casimir-Perier (kaz-i-mer' pa-rya'), 

596 n. 10. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



;29 



Cas''si-o-d5''''rus, Theodoric's minis- 
ter, 8 n. 2. 

Castelar (kas-ta-lar'), Emilio, 6i8. 

Castiglione (kas-tel-y5'ne), 538 n. 27. 

Castile (kas-ter), the name, 230 ; 
union with Aragon, 238. 

Castles, feudal, 88. 

Cateau Cambresis (ka-to' kori-bra- 
ze'), Peace of, 328. 

Cathedral building, 185. 

Catherine of Aragon, 339, 340, 341. 

Catherine II the Great, reign, 466- 
468. 

Catherine de' Medici (de ma'de- 
che), 377, 379. 

Catholic Emancipation Act, 607. 

Catholic League, in France, 381 ; 
in Germany, 387. 

Catholic Reaction, 308-314. 

Cavaliers, 430. 

Cavour (ka-voo/), Count, 625, 626, 
627, 628. 

Cawn-pur', 673 n. 13. 

Caxton, William, 219. 

Cecil, Robert, 353. 

Cecil, William. See Burghley. 

Celibacy of the clergy, 115. 

Celtic Church, 18, 19. 

Celts, at opening of the Middle 
Ages, 6; Christianity among, 17- 
19; conversion of Irish Celts by 
St. Patrick, 17. 

Cenis (se-ne'). Mount, tunnel, 626. 

Cerdagne (ser'dan''), 225. 

Cer-van'tes, 99. 

Chambers of Reunion, 409 n, 8. 

Champlain (sham-plan'), 383. 

Charlemagne (shar'le-man), king of 
Franks, 62-68 ; his wars, 62, 63 ; 
restores the Empire in the West, 
64, 65 ; as a ruler, 65-67 ; his 
Palace School, (y-] ; his death, 6-] ; 
results of his reign, 68 ; division 
of his dominions, 68. 

Charles Albert, king of Sardinia, 
623, 624. 

Charles the Bald, king of the West- 
em Franks, 80. 

Charles the Bold, duke of Bur- 
gundy, 225. 

Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine, 377. 

Charles Felix, king of Sardinia, 621. 

Charles Martel, at battle of Tours, 
54 ; creates a cavalry force, 86. 



Charles the Simple, king of the 
Western Franks, 75. 

Charles I, king of England, reign, 
425-434; II» reign, 443-446. 

Charles IV, king of France, 209; 
VI, 212; VII, 213, 214; VIII, 
225-227 ; IX, king of France, 377, 
379, 381 r X, 590. 

Charles IV, Emperor H. R. E., 
237 n. 18; V, commissions Magel- 
lan, 282 ; at Diet of Worms, 304, 
305; of Augsburg, 308; narrative 
of reign, 318-325 ; his abdication, 
325, 326; VI, 412, 472; VII, 473 
n. I. 

Charles II, king of Spain, 411 ; 
IV, 564. 

Charles XII, king of Sweden, 462, 
463, 464 n. 6. 

Chartism, 603. 

Chatham. See Pitt. 

Chaucer, Geoifrey, 217. 

Chev'i-ot (or chiv'i-ot) Hills, 338 
n. 3. 

Chil'de-ric, last Merovingian king, 
62. 

Children's Crusade, the, 138-140. 

China, question of partition of, 687 ; 
war with Japan, 688-690 ; dis- 
memberment of, 690 ; Boxer up- 
rising, 690 ; repubhc of, 691-693. 

Chivalry, origin of, 93, 94 ; its uni- 
versality, 94 ; training of the 
knight, 95 ; ceremony of knight- 
ing, 95, 96; the tournament, 96, 
97 ; character of the knight, 97, 
98; decline of the system; 98; 
evil and good in system, 99. 

Chos'ro-es II, king of Persia, 44. 

Christian IV, king of Denmark, 388 ; 
IX, 640. 

Christianity, as factor in mediaeval 
history, 4 ; introduced among the 
Teutonic tribes, 14-21 ; progress 
of, before the fall of Rome, 1 5 ; 
introduced into Russia, 21 ; re- 
acted upon by paganism, 22 ; in 
French Revolution, abolished, 

530- 
Chronicle, Anglo-Saxon, 74 n. 2. 
Chrys-o-l5'ras, Manuel, Greek 

scholar, 260. 
Church, early constitujtion of, 27 ; 

separation of the Eastern from 



730 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



the Western or Latin Church, 
32 ; growth of a martial spirit in, 
123, 124. See Papacy. 
Church Councils : Council of Nicaea, 
15; of Pisa, 156; of Constance, 
156; of Basel, 157; of Trent, 310, 

311- 

Church property, in France, nation- 
alized, 518. 

Cid, poem of the, 233. ^ 

Cimabue (che-ma-boo'a), 268 n. 14. 

Cisalpine Republic, first, 538, 541 ; 
second, 545, 552. 

Civil Code, 549. 

Civil Constitution of Clergy, in 
French Revolution, 518; ter- 
minated, 547. 

Civil War (1642-1649), in England, 

430-434- 

Clarendon, Constitutions of, 200. 

Clermont (kler-moii'). Council of, 
130. 

Clive, Robert, 490. 

Clo'vis, king of the Franks, 10; his 
conversion, 15. 

Cluniac revival, 122, 126. 

Cluny (klii-ne'), monastery of, 26; 
center 'of reform, 26, 114. 

Clyde, river, 483. 

Cobden, Richard, 602 n. i. 

Codes : Justinian Code, 43 ; Assizes 
of Jerusalem, 133; Code Napo- 
leon, 549. 

Colbert (kol-ber'), 406. 

CoFet, John, 295. 

Coligny, Gaspard de (ko-len-ye'), 

377, 378, 379, 380- ^^ ^^ 

Colonization, European, 664-667. 
See national titles such as Eng- 
lish Colonies. 

Colonnas, Giovanni, 259. 

Columbus, Christopher, importance 
of his achievement, 275; voyages 
of, 279, 280. 

Comiiatus, the, 81. 

Commendation, Gallic custom, 81, 

Commons, English House of, origin, 
203—205. See Parliament, Eng- 
lish. 

Commonwealth of England, 434- 

438. 
Commune, Revolutionary, of Paris, 

514. 
Communists, Paris, 595. 



Compass, invention of, 277 n. 2. 

Concordat, French, of 1801, 547. 

Condottieri (kon^ot-tya'^re), 179. 

Confederation of the Rhine, 556. 

Congo Free State, 668 n. 5. 

Conrad III, Emperor H. R. E., 134. 

Constance, Church Council of, 156; 
Peace of (1183), I77- 

Con'stan-tlne VI, Eastern em- 
peror, 64. 

Constantine, Palaeologus, last em- 
peror of the East, 166. 

Constantinople, besieged by Sara- 
cens, 53 ; captured by crusaders, 
136-138; by Ottoman Turks, 166. 

Constituent Assembly, French, 513- 

519- 

Constitutions: Austria (1849), 638; 
(1867), 651 ; England, 437 ; France 
(i79i),5i9; (1795), 535; (1799), 543; 
(i8i4),577; (1848), 5925(1851), 593; 
(1875), 596; Hungary (1867), 651; 
Non^-ay (1814), 584; Netherlands 
(1814), 584; Poland (1815), 655; 
Portugal (1820), 615 n. 2 ; Prussia 
(1850), 638; Sardinia (1848), 623; 
Spain (1812), 614; (1837), 618; 
(1875), 618; Switzerland (1815), 
584; Two Sicilies (1820), 620. 

Consulate, French, 543-551. 

Continental Blockade, 560-562. 

Conventicle Act, 443. 

Convention, French National, 523- 

536. 

Conway, castle, 206. 

Cook, James, Captain, 671. 

Copenhagen bombarded, 563. 

Co-per'ni-cus, Nicholas, 276 n. i. 

Cor-day', Charlotte, 526. 

Cordeliers (Eng. pron.kor'de-lers''). 
Club, 519. 

Cor'do-va, 54. 

Corn Laws repealed, 602 n. i. 

Comeille (kor-nay'), 417. 

Cor-6-man'del, 474. 

Corporation Act repealed, 606. 

Cor'pus Jufris Ci-vi'lis, 43. 

Correggio (kor-red'jo), 268 n. 14. 

Corsica, ceded to France, 419. 

Cortes (kor'tes), Spanish, 186 n. 14. 

Cortes (Span. pron. kor-tas'), Her- 
nando, 286. 

Co-run'na, battle of, 566 n. 23. 

Coster of Haarlem, 263 n. 8. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 731 



Coulanges (ko-lonzh'), Fustel de, 

187. 
Council, of Blood, 367 ; of the 

North, 426 n. 6; of Trent, 310, 

311; Vatican, 630 n. 5. 
Counter-Reform, Catholic, 310, 311. 
Coup (TEtat (koo-da-ta'), of Bru- 

maire, 540, 541 ; of December 2, 

1851, 593- 
Court of Arbitration, International, 

701. 
Covenanters, 428; persecution of, 

444. 
Cranmer, Thomas, 340, 341 ; death, 

350- 

Crecj (kres'se), battle of, 209. 

Crespy (kra-pe'), Peace of, 322. 

Crimea, Russia conquers, 466 ; war 
in, 656, 657. 

Crompton^ 494 n. 19. 

Cromwell, Oliver, parliamentary 
general, 431-436; seizes govern- 
ment, 437 ; Protector, 438-440 ; 
death, 440 ; treatment of body, 443. 

Cromwell, Richard, 440. 

Cromwell, Thomas, 340, 341 ; death, 

345 n. 5- 

Crusades, enumerated, 121 ; causes 
of, 122-127; circumstances favor- 
ing, 127-129 ; legend of Peter the 
Hermit, 129; Councils of Pia- 
cenza and Clermont, 130; narra- 
tive of the Crusades in the East, 
131-140; Crusades in Europe, 
141-143 ; their results for Euro- 
pean civilization, 143-146. See 
Table of Contents. 

Cul-16'den Moor, battle of, 487. 

Curfew, the, 107. 

Customs Union, German, 637. 

Cuzco (kooz'ko), 288. 

Cyprus, ceded to England, 660. 

Czechs (chechs or cheks), 652. 

Danelagh (dan'la), the, 72. 

Danes. See Scafidinavians. 

Dante, Alighieri (a-le-ge-a're), pre- 
cursor of the Renaissance, 253, 
254; his Commedia, 254. 

Dan'ton (Fr. pron. doh-toii'), in Con- 
vention, 523 : on first Committee 
of Public Safety, 525 ; death, 531. 

Da'ri-en, Isthmus of, Scotch colony 
at, 482. 



Dark Ages, the, character of , i, 2. 

Damley, Henry Stuart, Lord, 355. 

Declaration, of Indulgence, 447 ; of 
Rights, 448; of the Rights of 
Man, 516. 

Defoe, Daniel, 483. 

Delhi (derie), 162 

Demarcation, Papal Line of, 281,282. 

Denmark, in Thirty Years' War, 
388 ; Continental Blockade, 562 ; 
loses Norway, 583 n. 3 ; Schles- 
wig-Holstein War, 640, 641. See 
Calmar, Union of. 

Derby, Earl of, 604. 

Descartes (da-kart'), 417 n. 14. 

Des-i-de'ri-us, king of the Lom- 
bards, deposed by Charlemagne, 

63- 
Despots, Italian, 178, 179, 
Diane de Poitiers (di-an' de pwa- 

tya0,_376. 
Dias (de'as), Bartholomew, 278. 
Diderot (de-dro'), 507. 
Directory, French, 535-541. 
Disestablishment, in Ireland, 607- 

609; proposed in England and 

Scotland, 609. 
Disraeli (diz-ra'li), 608. 
Distribution of wealth in the 

United States, 707 n. 4. 
Divina Commedia (de-ve'na kom- 

ma^e-a), 254. 
Divine Right of Kings, the theory, 

396-398; its history, 398, 399; 

opinion . of James I on, 420 ; of 

Louis XIV, 403, 
Doge (doj), the name, 179, 
Domesday Book (doomz^'da'), 106, 
Dominicans, order of the, 151. 
Don Quixote (Sp. pron. don ke- 

ho'te), 99. 
D6n-a-teri6, 267 n. 10. 
Donation of Constantine, 32 n. 15; 

its unhistorical character shown 

by Valla, 273. 
Dragonnades (drag-o-nadz'), 409. 
Drake, Francis, 357, 359. 
Dreibund (dri'boont), 648. 
Dreyfus (driTus), Alfred, 598 n. 11. 
Drogheda (droch'e-da), 435. 
Duma, Russian, 663. 
Dunbar, battle of, 436. 
Dunkirk, 439. 
Duns Scotus, 195. 



732 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Duquesne (dii-kan^), Fort, 489. 

Dutch. See Netherlands. 

Dutch colonies, 444 ; at the Cape, 

674,675; in East Indies, 331,674 

n. 14. 

East India Company, English, 423, 

673- 

Eastern Empire, sketch of history, 
42-45 ; becomes Greek, 44, 45 ; 
services of, to European civiliza- 
tion, 45 ; effects upon, of Cru- 
sades, 143. 

Eastern Rumelia (roo-me'lia), 660 
n. 8. 

Ebro (a^brS), river, 564. 

Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 200 n. 2. 

Ecclesiastical Reservation, 324 ; vio- 
lated, 387. 

Eck, John, 303 n. 4. 

Edda, the, 73 n. i. 

E-des'sa, 134. 

Edgehill, battle of, 431 n. 10. 

Edict, of Nantes, 382 ; revoked, 409, 
410 ; of Grace, 385 ; of restitution, 
388; of Toleration in Austria, 
497 ; of Emancipation in Prussia, 
572 ; in Russia, 657, 658. 

Education, English acts, 602 n. i, 
604 ; question in France, 597. 

Education, reformed by the New 
Learning, 271. 

Edward, the Confessor, king of 
England, 75; his death, 103; I, 
205-208; II, 208; III, 208, 209, 
210, 211; VI, birth, 345; reign, 

347-349- 
Eglaert, king of Wessex, 12. 
Egmont, 366. 
Egypt, conquest of, by Saracens, 52 ; 

England in, 676-678. 
Einhard (in'hard), secretary of 

Charlemagne, 66. 
Elba, 576. 
Elbe (elb ; Ger. pron. ell)e), river, 

392- 
Electors, the Seven, of Germany. 

236, 237. 
Elizabeth, queen of England, reign, 

351-361. 
Elizabeth, tsaritsa, 475. 
Emigres (a-me-gra'), French, 516; 

return of, 547. 
Encyclopedists, 507. 



Enghien (oii-gian''), duke of, 550. 

England, origin of name, 12 ; Anglo- 
Saxon conquest of, 12 ; Christian- 
ity in, 16; results of conversion 
of Anglo-Saxons, 16; reign of 
Alfred the Great, 74 n. 2 ; Danish 
conquest, 75 ; Saxon line restored, 
75 ; Norman conquest and rule, 
103-109; under the houses of 
Plantagenet, Lancaster, and York, 
199-216; loss of possessions in 
France, 201 ; conquest of Wales, 
205, 206; wars W'ith Scotland, 
206-208 ; Hundred Years' War, 
208-215; Wars of the Roses, 215, 
216; under the Tudors, 334-361; 
in seventeenth century, 420-453 ; 
in eighteenth century, 480-496; 
since Waterloo, 599-613. See 
Table of Contents. 

English colonies, the Cabots, 237 '■> 
under Elizabeth, 359, 360; under 
James I, 423 ; under Anne, 482; 
in Seven Years' War, 488-491 ; in 
American Revolution, 491,-492; 
slavery abolished in, 493; at close 
of nineteenth century, 669-678. 

Enlightened despotism, theory of, 
400-402 ; exemplified by Cath- 
erine II, 466 ; by Frederick II, 
477, 478; by Joseph 11,497-499; 
by Napoleon, 547-549. 

Equality, principle of, 580. 

E-ras'mus, Desiderius, 295, 296. 

Er'furt, Congress of, 565. 

E-rig'e-na, John Scotus, 192. 

Eritrea (a-re-tra'a), 679 n. 19. 

Ertogrul (er'to-grool), Ottoman 
chieftain, 164, 165. 

Eschenbach (esh'en-bach), Wolfram 
of, 241 n. 22. 

Es-co'ri-al, the, 328 n. 10. 

Essenes (es-senz'), the, 23 n. 6. 

Essex, second earl of, 360 n. 8 ; third 
earl of, 431. 

Essling, battle of, 566. 

Estates-General. See States-General. 

E-tru'ri-a, kingdom of, 546. 

Ettenheim, 550. 

Eugene of Savoy, Prince, 412, 

Eugenie (e-zha-ne'). Empress, 594. 

Ev'e-lyn, John, 459 n. 3. 

Excommunication, effects of, 117. 

Eylau (ilou), battle of, 558. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 733 



Fa-bi^o-la, 27 n. 11. 

Factory Act, English, 602 n. i. 

Fairfax, Sir Thomas, 432. 

False Decretals, the, 32 n, 15. 

Faure (for), Felix, 596 n. 10. 

Faust, printer, 264. 

Faustus, legend of, 270 n. 15. 

Fawkes, Guy, 421. 

Federalism, 697-700. 

Fenelon (fan-loh''), 417 n. 14. 

Ferdinand of Aragon, marriage to 
Isabella of Castile, 230; sets up 
the Inquisition, 232 ; his death, 
232. 

Ferdinand I, Emperor of Austria, 
638. 

Ferdinand II, Emperor H.R.E., 388. 

Ferdinand VII, king of Spain, ac- 
cession, 614; reign, 616. 

Ferdinand IV, king of Naples, as 
Ferdinand I, king of the Two 
Sicilies, 620, 

Feudalism, defined, 77 ; subinfeuda- 
tion, 77; origin of fiefs, 80; ori- 
gin of feudal patronage, 81 ; origin 
of feudal sovereignty, 81, 82 ; cere- 
mony of homage, 82 ; relation of 
lord and vassal, — reliefs, fines, 
aids, etc., 83 ; manorial serfs, 84- 
86 ; development of the feudal sys- 
tem, 86-88 ; castles of the nobles, 
88, 89; sports of the nobles, 89; 
causes of decay, 89-91 ; extinc- 
tion of, in different countries, 90 
n. 7; defects of the system, gT; 
good results of the system, 92, 93 ; 
effects upon, of Crusades, 145. 

Feuillants (fe-yon'), 520. 

Fich'te, 571. 

Field of Cloth of Gold, 321 n. 3. 

Filmer, quoted, 397, 398. 

Fine arts, revival of the, 266-269. 

Finland, Russia conquers, 559, 565; 
Russianization of, 662, 663. 

Finns, the, 22. 

Fire-worshipers, 53 n. 7. 

Fisher, John, bishop of Rochester, 
342. 

Five Mile Act, 444, 

Flag'el-lants, the, 210 n. 8. 

Flodden Field, battle of, 338 n. 3. 

Florence, sketch of history, 182, 183. 

Forest laws of the Normans, 108. 

For-mo'sa, 689. 



Fra An-gelli-co, 268 n. 14. 

France, beginnings of French king- 
dom, 220; the Capetian period, 
220-224; table of Capetian kings 
(direct line), 220 n. 11; in the 
Crusades, 222; effects upon, of 
the Hundred Years' War, 224; 
under the mediaeval Valois, 224- 
227; wars with Charles V, 320- 
323 ; under the later Valois kings, 
376-381 ; under Henry IV, 381- 
384 ; under Louis XIII, 384-386 ; 
gains in Treaty of Westphalia, 
392 ; under Louis XIV, 403-417 ; 
Louis XV, 417-419;- condition 
in eighteenth century, 500-509 ; 
under Louis XVI, 509-524 ; the 
Revolution, 524-542; the Con- 
sulate, 543-551 ; the Empire, 551- 
576 ; since Waterloo, 589-598. 

Franche-Comte (froiish-kon-ta'), 408. 

Francis I, Emperor H.R.E., 473 n. 
I ; II, makes Treaty of Campo 
Formio, 538; of Luneville, 545; 
as Francis I, Emperor of Austria, 
556. 

Francis I, king of France, rival of 
Charles V, 320, 321 ; wars with 
Charles V, 321-323 ; persecution 
of Waldenses, 323 ; II, reign of, 
376, 377- 

Francis II, king of Two Sicilies, 627. 

Francis Joseph, Emperor of Austria, 
accession, 638; makes Peace of 
Villafranca, 627 ; of Prague, 642 ; 
grants reforms to Hungary, 650 ; 
popularity of, 652. 

Franciscans, order of the, 151, 152. 

Franco -Prussian War, 594-596, 
643-646. 

Frankfort (Ger. Frankfurt) ; Con- 
stituent Assembly at, 639 n. 4; 
annexed to Prussia, 642. 

Franks, the, under the Merovin- 
gians, 9, 10 ; their conversion, 15 ; 
importance of conversion, 15. 

Frederick I, Barbarossa, Emperor 
H R. E., in Third Crusade, 135 ; 
quarrel with Pope Alexander III, 
149; his struggle with the Lom- 
bard League, 176, 177; repre- 
sents German nationality, 235 ; 
II, relations to the Papacy, 152, 
153- 



734 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Frederick IV, king of Denmark, 
463 ; VII, 640. 

Frederick (III) I, king of Prussia, 
470; II, the Great, 472-479; in 
partition of Poland, 476. 

Frederick V, Elector Palatine, king 
of Bohemia, 388 n. 2. 

Frederick the Wise, elector of Sax- 
ony, 305. 

Frederick William, Great Elector 
of Brandenburg, 469. 

Frederick William I, king of Prus- 
sia, 470, 471, III, campaign of 
Jena, 557, 558; at Tilsit, 560 ; IV, 
grants Constitution, 638. 

Free Imperial Cities, 237, 238. 

French and Indian War. See Seveji 
Yei.i.rs' IVai: 

French colonies, under Henry IV, 
383; under Louis XIV, 413, 414; 
under Louis XV, 418; under 
Napoleon I, 546; at close of 
nmeteenth century, 678-680. 

Friedland (fret'lant), battle of, 558. 

Froissart (frwa-sar'), 229. 

Fronde, Wars of the, 404 n. 5. 

Fulton, Robert, 554. 

Fusillades (fiis-e-yad'), 534. 

Ga'len, 191. 

Galicia (ga-lish'i-a), 558. 

Galileo (gal-i-le'5), 276 n. i. 

Ga'ma, Vasco da, 280, 281. 

Garibaldi (ga-re-barde), sketch of 

life, 625 ; in Sicily and Naples, 

627, 628. 
Gas'cons, the, 63 n. 2. 
Ged'des, Janet, 428. 
Geiseric, king of the Vandals, 14. 
Gen'o-a, 181, 182. 

Geography, knowledge of, in fif- 
teenth and sixteenth centuries, 

277-284. 
George I, king of England, 484 ; II, 

484 ; III, 484. 
Gepl-dae, mentioned, 10 n. 5. 
Gerard (zha-rar'), Balthasar, 372. 
German colonies, 680-682. 
German Confederation, 634-636. 
German Empire, New, formed, 645, 

646 ; recent history af, 647-649. 
German tribes. See Tetttons. 
Germany, conversion of German 

tribes, 20, 21 ; beginnings of the 



kingdom of, 233, 234- renewal of 
the empire by Otto the Great, 
234; under the Hohenstaufen, 
235, 236; the Electors, 236; the 
Interregnum, 237 ; the Free Im- 
perial Cities, 237, 238; under the 
Hapsburgs, 240 ; humanism in, 
297, 298 ; reformation in, 298- 
308 ; Thirty Years' War in, 387- 
394 ; Peace of Westphalia, 391- 
393 ; effects of Thirty Years' War 
upon, 393, 394; reorganized by 
Napoleon, 555, 556; coast lands 
annexed to France, 568 ; reorgan- 
ized by Congress of Vienna, 584 ; 
Confederation, 634-636 ; Cus- 
toms Union, 637 ; Revolution of 
1848 in, 637-639; North German 
Confederation, 642, 643 ; German 
Empire formed, 645, 646. See 
Ger7nan Empire^ New. 

Ghent, Pacification of, 369. 

Ghibellines (gib'el-linz), the, 178 n. 5. 

Ghiberti (ge-ber'te), sculptor, 267 n. 
10. 

Giants, regiment of, 471. 

Gibbon, the historian, mentioned, 5. 

Gibraltar, 413. 

Gilds, the, 172. 

Giotto (jot'to), 268 n. 14. 

Girondins (ji-ron'dinz), in Legis- 
lative Assembly, 526; in Con- 
vention, 523, 526; execution of, 

529- 

Gladstone, William Ewart, Reform 
Bill of 1 884, 604 , disestablish- 
ment of Irish Church, 608 ; Irish 
Home Rule, 610; death, 610. 

Go-ber, 382. _ 

Godfrey of Bouillon (god'friboo- 
yon^, 132; made head of Latin 
kingdom of Jerusalem, 133. 

Goethe (ge'te), at Erfurt, 565 ; 
cosmopolitanism of, 572 n. 26. 

Golden Bull, the, 237 n. 18. 

Good Hope, Cape of, discovered, 7. 

Gordon, Charles George, general, 

677- 

Goths. See Ostrogoths and Visi- 
goths. 

Goumay (goor-na'), Vincent de, 
508 n. 7. 

Granada, conquest of, 230, 231; 
Moriscos expelled from, 329. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



735 



Grand Alliance, of 1689, 411 ; of 
1701, 412. 

Grand Design of Henry IV, 383 
n. 8. 

Grand Remonstrance, the, 429 n. 9. 

Gravelines (grav-len'), tjattle of, 
328 n. 10. 

Gravelotte (grav-lot'), battle of, 595. 

Great Britain, the name, 315. See 
England. 

Great Fire, the, at London, 445. 

Great Moguls, the. 162. 

Great Schism, the, 155, 156. 

Greece, since 1864, 655 n. 2. 

Greek Church, the, 32. 

Greek Empire. See Eastern Em- 
pire. 

Greek fire, 53. 

Greek Independence, War of, 654 
n. I. 

Greenland, discovered by the North- 
men, 73. 

Grevy (gra-ve'), 596 n. 10. 

Grey, Jane, 349. 

Grotius (gro'shi-us), Hugo, 282 n. 7. 

Guadalquivir (gua-dal-ke-ver'), river, 
56. 

Guebers (gelDers). See Fire- 
worshipers. 

Guelphs (gwelfs), the, 178 n. 5. 

Guicciardini (gwe-char-de'ne), Fran- 
cesco, 178. 

Guillotine, the, 533. 

Guinea, gulf of, discovered, 278. 

Guiscard (ges-kar'), Robert, 102, 
103. 

Guise (gUez), Francis, second duke 
of, ni, 37_8. 

Guizot (ge-zo'), 592. . 

Gunpowder, effects of use in war, 
90. 

Gunpowder Plot, 421. 

Gustavus I, Vasa, king of Sweden, 
307; II, Adolphus, m Thirty 
Years' War, 389-390. 

Gutenberg (goo'ten-berc), John, 
263, 264. 

Haarlem (har'lem), 369, n. 4. 
Habeas Corpus Act, 446. 
Hague (hag). The, 701. 
Haiti (ha'ti), in French Revolution, 

546. 
Hamburg, 173. 



Hampden, John, 427. 

Hanover, House of, in England, 

484 n. 5. 
Hanover, Prussia annexes, 642. 
Hanseatic League, 173-175. 
Hapsburg, House of. See Austria^ 

House of. 
Hardenburg, Prussian minister, 572 

n. 27. 
Hargreaves (har'grevz), 494. 
Harold, king of England, 104, 105. 
Harun-al-Raschid (ha-roon'al- 

rash''-id), caliph, 55. 
Hassan (ha'sen), 55 n. 9. 
Hastings, battle of, 104. 
Hav'e-lock, Henry, 673 n. 13. 
Hebert (a-ber^), 530. 
Hegira (he-jfra or hej'i-ra), the, 48. 
Heidelberg (hi'del-berc), 411. 
Heloise (a-16-ez'), pupil of Abelard, 

194. 
Helvetic Republic, formed, 540. 
Heng'ist, Jutish chief, 16. 
Henry I, king of England, 108 ; II, 

200; III, 203; V, 212; VII, at 

Bosworth Field, 215. 
Henry III, Emperor H, R. E., 114; 

IV, 117-119; VI, 136. 
Henry VII, king of England, reign, 

ZZS-ZZ1 ; VIII, reign, -iZl-ZAl- 
Henry II, king of France, 376 ; III, 

380, 381; IV, marriage, 379; 

reign, 381-384. 
Henry of Bourbon, king of Navarre, 

379- 

Henry the Cardinal, king of Portu- 
gal, 330- 

Henry, Prince, the Navigator, 278. 

Hep'tar-chy, Saxon, 12. 

Her'a-clfus, Eastern Emperor, 
reign, 44. 

Her'i-ot, the, 85. 

Hermits, 22, 23. 

Herzegovina (hert-se-go-ve'na), re- 
volt in, 659^ administered by 
Austria-Hungary, 660. 

Hesse-Cassel (hes'Tcas'el), annexed 
to Prussia, 642. 

Hesse-Darmstadt (hes'darm'stat), 

643- 
High Commission Court, 426 n. 6. 
Hil'de-brand. See Pope Gregory 

Hip-poc'ra-tes, 191, 



736 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Hohenlinden, battle of, 545. 

Hohenstaufen (h6"en-stow'fen), 
House of, Germany under, 235, 
236. 

Hohenzollern (ho'en-tsol-lem). 
House of, in Brandenburg, 469; 
in Prussia, 470. 

Holland, kingdom of, created, 552 ; 
annexed to France, 568. See 
Nethe7'lands. 

Holstein (hols'stin), duchy of, 649; 
annexed to Prussia, 642. 

Holy Alliance, 586. 

Holy League of 1609, 387. 

Holy Office. See Inquisition, 

Holy Roman Empire, name attaches 
to Western Empire, 70 ; relations 
of, to the Papacy, 111-113; 
under Henry IV, 117-119; Con- 
cordat of Worms, 119; brought 
to ruin by the Papacy, 152, 153 ; 
results for Germany of the re- 
newal of the imperial authority, 
234; election of Charles V, 318; 
end of, 555, 556. 

Holy Synod, established in Russia, 
462. 

Holy Wars. See Crusades. 

Homage, ceremony of, 82. 

Home Rule, Irish, 610, 611. 

Hoom (horn), count of, 366. 

Ho-sain^ 55 n. 9. 

Hos'pi-tal-ers, order of the, origin 
of, 133 n. 5 ; incident in history, 
167 ; lose Rhodes, 322. 

Howard, Catherine, 345. 

Howard, John, 493 n. 18. 

Howard of Effingham, 357. 

Hubertsburg, Treaty of, 476. 

Hudson Bay territory, 413. 

Huguenots (hu'ge-nots), name, 377 
n. 2 ; wars, 377-385 ; struggle 
with Richelieu, 385 ; after Revoca- 
tion of the Edict of Nantes, 410 ; 
Cromwell protects, 439. 

Humanism, defined, 256 ; Petrarch, 
first of the humanists, 256-258; 
Boccaccio, as a humanist, 259; 
Chrysoloras, Greek teacher, 260 ; 
search for ancient manuscripts, 
260; patrons of the New Learn- 
ing, 261 ; fall of Constantinople 
gives impulse to, 262 ; translation 
and criticism of the classics, 262 ; 



invention of printing in relation 
to the revival, 263 ; humanism in 
the North, 265, 266; effects of 
the classical revival upon vernac- 
ular literatures, 272 ; at Oxford, 
295 ; in Germany, 297, 298. See 
Renaissance. 

Hum'ber, river, 105. 

Humbert I, king of Italy, 629. 

Hundred Days, the, 576-579. 

Hundred Years' War, 208-215; 
results for France, 224. 

Hungarians, conversion of, 128. 

Hungary, overrun by Turks, 322; 
under Maria Theresa, 473 ; under 
Joseph II, 498 ; Revolution of 
1848 in, 638 n. 2 ; in Austro- 
Hungarian monarchy, 650-653. 

Huss, John, 239. 

Hussites, the, 239. 

Hutten (hoot'ten), Ulrich von, 298. 

Iceland, settled from Norway, 73. 

Iconoclastic controversy, 31, 32. 

Iconoclasts, in Netherlands, 366. 

Illyrian Provinces, 566, 567. 

Immunity, grants of, 82. 

Incas, 287, 288. 

Independents, Enghsh religious 
party (known at first as Separa- 
tists), in Civil War, 431, 432. 

India, Portuguese in, 281 ; English 
in, 423, 476, 490, 491 ; French in, 
413 n. 13, 419, 490, 491. 

Indians, American, origin of name, 
280. 

Indulgences, defined, 299 n. 2 ; his- 
tory of, 299, 300; granting of, by 
Tetzel, 301 ; Luther's theses on, 
302, 303. 

Industrial Democracy, 705-708. 

Inquisition, the, in Languedoc, 143 ; 
in Spain, 232; procedure, 311, 
312 ; in Netherlands, 364, 367 ; in 
Spain, 326, 327 ; in Spanish col- 
onies, 616. 

Instrument of Government, 437. 

Interdict, effects of, 117. 

Interregnum, the, in German his- 
tory, 237. 

Investiture, contest respecting, 116- 
120. 

lona (1-6'na or e-o'na), monastery 
of, 17. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 737 



Ionian Islands, annexed to France, 
539 ; independent, 546 ; ceded to 
France, 559; ceded to Greece, 
655 n. 2. 

Ireland, conversion of, 17; under 
Elizabeth, 359 ; under James I, 
423, 424; insurrection of 1641, 
429; Cromwell in, 435; William 
III in, -452 ; legislative independ- 
ence, 492 ; disestablishment of 
Church in, 607, 608 ; the Union, 
609; in nineteenth century, 609- 

613. 

Irene (i-re'ne or I-ren'), Eastern 
empress, 64. 

Ire''ton, 443. 

Iron Crown of Lombards, 11. 

"Ironsides," Cromwell's, 431. 

Isabella, queen of Castile, marriage 
to Ferdinand of Aragon, 230 ; sets 
up the Inquisition, 232; death, 232. 

Islam. See Mohammedanism. 

Istria, 566. 

Italian city-republics, general ac- 
count of, 175-179; causes of 
their early growth, 175, 176; the 
Lombard League, 176, 177; dis- 
sensions among, 178 ; despots 
in, 178, 179 ; Venice, 1 79-1 81 ; 
Genoa, 181, 182; Florence, 182, 
183. 

Italian colonies, 679 n. 19. 

Italian Renaissance. See Renais- 
sance. 

Italy, results of Lombard conquest, 
1 1 ; recovery of, by Justinian, 42 ; 
Renaissance in, 247 ; invaded by 
Charles VIII, 226; no national 
government during Middle Ages, 
244 ; the Five Great States, 246, 
247 ; at Congress of Vienna, 584, 
619; since Congress of Vienna, 
619-633 ; kingdom of, formed, 
627, 628 ; Italia irredenia, 629 n. 
2 ; relations of kingdom of, with 
Papacy, 630-632. See Italian 
City- Republics and Renaissance. 

Ivan (e-van') III, the Great, tsar, 
243, 455 n. i; IV, the Terrible, 
454» 455- 

Jacobin Club, origin, 519 ; closed, 

, 535; 

Jacobites, support James II, 452. 



Jaffa, 540. 

Jamaica, 439. 

James I, king of England, reign, 
420-425 ; II, as Duke of York, 
445 ; reign, 447, 448 ; attempt to 
recover throne, 452. 

James IV, king of Scotland, mar- 
riage, 337; death, 338 n. 3; V, 

354. 

Jamestown, 423. 

Jan'i-za-ries, the, 165. 

Japan, awakening of, 687, 688; 
war with China, 688-690; the 
Imperial Regalia, 688 n. 27 ; war 
with Russia, 693-695. 

Java, 674 n. 14. 

Jeffreys, Chief Justice, 447 n. 16. 

Jena (ya'na), battle of, 558. 

Jenghiz Khan (jen'gis-khan), 160. 

Jerome of Prague, 239. 

Jerome Bonaparte, king of West- 
phalia, 560. 

Jerusalem, captured by crusaders, 
133 ; Latin Kingdom of, 133 ; cap- 
tured by Saladin, 135. 

Jesuits, Society of the, 312-314; 
expelled from France, 597. 

Jews, expelled from Spain, 232 ; 
political disabilities removed in 
England, 607. 

Joan of Arc, 213, 214. 

Joanna, queen of Castile, 318. 

John, king of England, quarrel with 
Pope Innocent III, 150; becomes 
vassal of the papal see, 150; for- 
feits lands in France, 202 ; grants 
Magna Carta, 202. 

John the Good, king of France, 211. 

John VI, king of Portugal, 615 n. 2. 

John of Austria, Don, at Lepanto, 
330; in Netherlands, 370. 

John of Leyden, 307 n. 10. 

John Sobieski, king of Poland, 409. 

Joseph II, Emperor H. R. E., 497- 
499. 

Joseph Bonaparte, king of Spain, 

563' 564- 
Josephine, 567. 
Jourdan (zhoor-don'^, campaign of 

1796, 537» 538- 
Juan Ponce de Leon (pon-tha da la- 

on'), 286 n. II. 
Jubilees, papal, 300. 
Junot (zhii-no'), 563. 



738 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Justinian, Era of, 42 ; his reign, 42- 

44; his code, 43. 
Jutes, the, 12. 

Kaaba (ka'ba, or ka-a'ba), the, 46. 

Kant, Immanuel, quoted, 699. 

Ka-zan', 454. 

Ker-man', 53 n. 7. 

Khar-tum', 677. 

Khedive (ka'dev"), 677. 

Kiau-chau (kyow-chow), 682, 690. 

Kiel (kel), Treaty of, 583 n. 3. 

Kiev (ke'ev), 161. 

Kitchener, Lord, 677. 

Kleber (kla-ber'), in Egypt, 540, 541 ; 

death, 545. 
Knighthood, See Chivalry. 
Knox, John, 354. 
Konieh (ko'ne-e), 681. 
Koniggratz (ke'nig-grets), battle of, 

642. 
Konigsberg (ke'nigs-berc), 142. 
Ko'ran, the,, origin of, 51 ; contents 

of, 51, 52. 
K5-re'a, 688, 689, 694, 695. 
Koreish (ko-rish'), Arab clan, 48. 
Komer (ker'ner), 571. 
Kosciuszko (kos-i-us'ko), 468. 
Kossuth (kosh'oot), Louis, 638 n. 2. 
Kremlin, the, 574. 
Kriig'er, Paul, 675. 
Kublai Khan (koob'll-khan), 162. 
KuUurkampf (kool-toor'kampf), 

647. 
Ku-ro-patTcin, Russian general, 694. 
Kwang-chau-wan (kwang-chow-wan), 

690. 

Labor Problem, the, 706, 707. 

La Bruyere (la brii-yer'), 417 n. 14. 

Lafayette (la-fa-yet'), in America, 
508; in Constituent Assembly, 
513; commands National Guard, 

517- 
Laibach (ll^bach), Congress of, 

615 n. I. 
Lamartine (la-mar-ten'), 592. 
Lancaster, House of, 199 n. i. See 

Roses, Wars of the. 
Langland, William, 218. 
Langton, Stephen, 150. 
Languedoc (lang'gwe-dok), 143. 
Langue d^Oc (lahg'dok"), French 

dialect, 227. 



Langue d^O'il (larifdwel"), French 

dialect, 227. 
Lapps, the, 22. 
La Rochelle (la ro-shel'). Huguenot 

stronghold, 382 ; siege of, 385. 
La Salle (la sal'), 418. 
Las Ca'sas, 289 n. 14. 
Latimer, bishop, 350. 
Latin Empire of Constantinople, 

13^138. 
Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 

founded, 1 33 ; end of, 140. 
Laud, William, 426, 428 n. 8. 
Law, John, 418. 

Legion of Honor, established, 550. 
Legislative Assembly, French, 519- 

523- 

Legnano (lan-ya'no), battle of, 177. 

Leicester (les'ter) Abbey, 340. 

Leipzig (lip'tsio), battle of (1631), 
390; (1813), 575.576. 

Leo the Isaurian, 31, 32. 

Leonardo da Vinci (la-o-nar'do da 
vin'che), 268. 

Leopold I, Emperor H. R. E., 412. 

Leopold I, king of the Belgians, 
591 ; n, 668. 

Leopold of Hohenzollem, offered 
Spanish crovsrn, 644. 

Le-pan'to, battle of, 329, 330. 

Les'seps, Ferdinand de, 597, 598. 

Lessing, 572 n. 26. 

Lettres de cachet (let'r-de-ka-sha"), 
501. 

Leuthen (loi'ten), battle of, 474. 

Lew'es, battle of, 204. 

Lewis I, the Pious, king of the 
Franks, 68. 

Leyden (ll'den), 369 n. 4. 

Liberuni veto, 467 n. 7. 

Libraries, founding of, 261. 

"Light Brigade," the, 657. 

Ligurian Republic, formed, 538 ; 
annexed to France, 552. 

Literature, English, Old English 
period, 19, 20 ; later mediaeval 
period, 217-220; under Henry 
VIII, 346, 347 ; under Elizabeth, 
360, 361 ; of the Puritan period, 
442, 443 ; of the Restoration, 449, 
450 ; of Queen Anne's Age, 483. 

Literature, French, beginnings of, 
227-229; under Louis XIV, 416, 
41 7; in eighteenth century, 505-508. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



739 



Literature, German, beginnings of, 

241, 242. 
Literature, Spanish, beginnings of, 

.233- 
Literatures, vernacular, beginnings 

of, 252; development fostered by 

classical revival, 272. 
Liveries, Statute of, 236. 
Livingstone, David, 667. 
Llewellyn (loo-el'in) III, Welsh 

prince, 205. 
Local Government Act, England, 

605 n. 2 ; Scotland, 605 n. 2 ; Ire- 
land, 605 n. 2. 
Locke, John, 505 n. 5. 
Lodi (lo'de), battle of, 538 n. 27. 
LoHards, the, 219. 
Lombard League, 176, 177. 
Lombards, kingdom of the, 10, 11 ; 

destroyed by Charles the Great, 

63- 
Lombardy, ceded to Austria, 583 ; 

to Sardinia, 627. 
Loom, power, invented, 494. 
Lorraine, part of, ceded to German 

Empire, 595, 646, 647. 
Lo-thair', Emperor H. R, E., 68, 69. 
Loubet (loo-ba'), 596 n. 10. 
Louis I, Prince of Cond^ (kon-da^), 

377- 
Louis VII, king of France, 134 ; IX, 
140 n. 9; XI, 225; XIII, 384- 
386; XIV, reign, 403-417; rela- 
tions with Charles II, 445 ; with 
James II, 447 ; with WilHam III, 
452, 453; XV, reign, 417-419; 
death, 509; XVI, 509-524; XVII 
(dauphin), 528 n. 19; XVIII, 
accession, 576; 577 ; reign, 577- 

579, 589. 
Louis Bonaparte, king of Holland, 

552 ; abdication of, 568. 
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte. See 

Napoleon III. 
Louis Philippe, king of the French, 

590-592. 
Louisa, queen of Prussia, 560. 
Louisburg, 486 n. 8. 
Louisiana, granted to Mississippi 

Company, 418; ceded to France, 

546; to United States, 553. 
Low countries. See Netherlands^ 

Belgium. 
Lo-yo'la, Ignatius of, 312, 313. 



Lii'beck, 143; Peace of, 388; an- 
nexed to France, 568. 

Lucerne, Lion of, 522 n. 14. 

Luneville (lii-na-veF), Peace of, 545. 

Luther, Martin, his pilgrimage to 
Rome, 301, 302; his ninety-five 
theses, 302, 303 ; his address to 
the Christian nobility of the Ger- 
man nation, 303, 304 ; burns the 
papal bull, 304; at the Diet of 
Worms, 304, 305; at the Wart- 
burg, 305, 306 ; his death, 308. 

Lutherans, 309. 

Lutter (loot'ter), battle of, 388 n. 3. 

Liitzen (liit'sen), battle of (1632), 
390; {1813), 576. 

Lyons, terror at, 534. 

Macedonia, 660 n. 9. 

Machiavelli (mak-e-a-vel'le), Nicho- 
las, 247 ; his Prince, 247, 248. 

MacMahon (mak-ma-6h'), Marshal, 
596 n. 10. 

Madagascar, French in, 679. 

Ma-drid', Treaty of, 321. 

Magdeburg (mag'de-boorc), sack of, 
by Tilly, 389, 390. 

Magellan, Ferdinand, his circum- 
navigation of the globe, 282, 283 ; 
results of the achievement, 283, 
284. 

Ma-gen'ta, battle of, 626. 

Magna Carta, 202, 203. 

Magyars (mod'yorz"). See Hun- 
gary. 

Mahdi (ma'de), the, 677. 

Mainz (mints), 263. 

Mal-a-bar' coast, 281. 

Malplaquet (mal-pla-ka'), battle of, 
412. 

Mam'e-luke, 539. 

Man-chu'ri-a, Chinese province, oc- 
cupied by Russia, 684, 693. 

Manorial system, the, 84-86. 

Man'tu-a, siege of, 538 n. 27. 

Manuscripts, search for, by human- 
ists, 260. 

Marat (ma-ra'), 525 ; death, 526, 527. 

Marches, the, union with Sardinia, 
628. 

Marco Po'lo, mentioned, 146; at 
Mongol court, 162. 

Ma-ren'go, battle of, 545. 

Margaret of Denmark, 249. 



740 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Margaret, Duchess of Parma, 365, 

367. 

Margaret of Valois, 379. 

Margaret Tudor, 337. 

Maria Theresa (ma-re'a te-re'sa), 
wife of Louis XIV, 407 n, 7. 

Maria Theresa, queen of Hungary, 
accession, 473 ; in partition of 
Poland, 467 ; in War of Austrian 
Succession, 473 ; in Seven Years' 
War, 474. 

Marie Antoinette (marl an-toi-nef), 
marriage, 509; death, 528. 

Marie Louise, 567. 

Marienburg (ma-re'en-boorG), 142. 

Marlborough, Duke of, 412. 

Marseillais (mar-se-lya'), the six 
hundred, 522. 

Marseillaise (mar-se-lyaz'), the, 522 
n. 13. 

Marseilles (mar-salz'), 139. 

Marston Moor, battle of, 431 n. 10. 

Mary I, queen of England, birth, 
339 ; persecuted by Edward VI, 
349; reign, 349-351 5 marriage 
to Philip II, 349 ; II, 448-453. 

Mary de' Medici (da-ma'de-che), 384. 

Mary Stuart, queen of Scots, 354- 

356. 
Matilda, Countess of Tuscany, 118. 
Matilda, Empress, 108. 
Matthias (ma-thi'as), Emperor 

H. R. E., 387. 
Maurice, stadtholder, 373. 
Max-i-mirian I, Emperor H. R. E., 

240. 
Mayors of the Palace, 10. 
Maz'a-rin, French minister, 404, 405. 
Mazzini (mat-se'ne), Joseph, 622, 

623, 
Mec'ca, 46. 
Medici (med'e-che), Cos'i-mo de', 

183 n. 8 ; Lorenzo de', 183 n. 8. 
Medici, the, patrons of the New 

Learning, 261. 
Medina (me-de'na), 48, 49. 
Melanchthon (me-langk'thon), 308 

n. 12. 
Mendicant friars. See Dominicans 

and Franciscans. 
Menelik, king of Abyssinia, 679 

n. 19. 
Merovingians, Franks, under the, 

9, ID. 



Mer'6-wig, 10 n. 4. 

Methodists, rise of, 487, 488 ; demand 
religious equality, 606. 

Metric system, 529. 

Met'ter-nich, Prince, at Congress of 
Vienna, 585 ; policy of, 585 ; in- 
tervention in Two Sicilies, 620, 
621 ; influence in Germany, 636; 
overthrow of, 638. 

Metz, ceded to France, 392 ; siege 

of, 595- 

Meuse (muz), river, 68. 

Mexico, conquest by Spain, 2S5-287. 

Michael Angelo, 268. 

Michael Romanov, 455. 

Mi-lan' Decree, 561. 

Milan destroyed by Frederick Bar- 
barossa, 177. 

Military and Religious Orders. See 
Hospitalers and Templars. 

Milton, John, 442. 

Min'^ne-sing'ers, 241. 

Mir, the Russian, 657 n. 5. 

Mirabeau (me-ra-b5'), 512, 513, 514. 

Mirandola, Pico della (me-ran'do-la, 
pe'ko), 262 n. 7. 

Mississippi Bubble, the, 418. 

Missolonghi(mis-so-long'ge),654n.i. 

Moawiyah (mo-a-we'yeh), caliph, 55. 

M5'de-na, restoration in, 619; union 
with Sardinia, 627. 

Mohammed, 48-51. 

Mohammed II, sultan of the Otto- 
mans, 166. 

Mohammedanism, rise of, 46-5 1 ; 
doctrines, 51, 52; under earlier 
caliphs, 52-56; its law system, 56; 
polygamy under, 59 ; slavery, 59. 

Mol-da'vi-a, partial independence of, 
655 ; in Rumania, 666 n. 8. 

Moliere (mo-lyer'), 417. 

Molt^e, Von, 641. 

Mo-luc'cas, the, 282. 

Monasteries, suppression of, in Eng- 
land, 342-344- 

Monasticism, defined, 22 ; its origin, 
23 ; in the East, 23 ; in the West, 
23, 24; the Benedictine monks, 
25; monastic reform, 25, 26; serv- 
ices rendered by, to civilization, 
26, 27. 

Mongols, general account of their 
conquests, 160-164; their inva- 
sion of Russia^ 161, 242. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 741 



Monk, George, 440. 

Monks. See Monasticism. 

Monmouth, Duke of, 447 n. 16. 

Monroe Doctrine, 616, 617. 

Montcalm (mont-kam'), 490. 

Monte Cassino (mon'ta kas-se'no), 
monastery, 24, 25. 

Montenegro (ra5n-te-na'gr6), 659, 
660 n. 8. 

Montesquieu (mon-tes-kye'), 505. 

Mon-te-zu^ma, 286. 

Montfort, Simon de, leader of the 
Albigensian crusade, 143 ; the 
English earl, 204. 

Moore, Sir John, 566 n. 23. 

Moors, the, 231. 

More, Sir Thomas, humanist, 296; 
death, 342 ; his Utopia, 346, 347. 

Moreau (m5-r5'), campaign of 1796, 
537» 538 ; of 1800, 545. 

Mor-gar'ten, battle of, 239 n. 20. 

Moriscos, the, 231 ; under Charles V, 
329 ; under Philip II, 329 ; expul- 
sion of, 331, 332. 

Morocco, 669 n. 6. 

Morton, Cardinal, 336. 

Moscow (mos'ko or mos'kow). Napo- 
leon in, 574, 575. 

Mountainists, the, 523. 

Municipal Reform Act, 603. 

Miin^ster, Anabaptists at, 307 n. 10 ; 
congress at, 391. 

Miinzer (miint'ser), 306. 

Murat (mtl-ra'), Joachim, 564. 

Mus'co-vy, 243. 

Mutiny Act, 452 n. 19. 

Nafels (na^fels), battle of, 239 n. 20. 

Na'na Sa'hib, 673 n. 13. 

Nantes (nants ; Fr. pron. noht), Edict 
of, 382 ; revocation of, 409, 410, 
terror at, 534. 

Naples, kingdom of, founded by 
Normans, 102, 103 ; laid claim to, 
by Charles VIII, 226; vicissi- 
tudes of its history, 235 n, 17; 
Murat, king of, 564 n. 19 ; becomes 
part of the kingdom of Italy, 627, 
628. 

Napoleon I, Bonaparte, guards Con- 
vention, 536 ; campaign in Italy, 
537, 538 ; campaign in Egypt, 539, 
540 ; overthrows Directory, 541 ; 
First Consul, 543-551 ; Emperor, 



551-576; at Elba, 576; the Hun- 
dred Days, 576-579 ; at St. Hel- 
ena, 579 ; II (King of Rome), 
bom, 568 ; proclaimed, 578 n. 31 ; 
III, 592 n. 3 ; reign, 593-596. 

NarVa, battle of, 463. 

Naseby (naz'bi), battle of, 432. 

Nassau, 366 n. 2 ; annexed to Prussia, 
642. 

Na-tal', 676. 

National Guards, French, organized, 

514- 

Nationality, principle of, 581. 

Navarino (na-va-re'no), battle of, 
654 n. I. 

Navarre, king of. See Antony of 
Bouj'bon, Henry IV. 

Navigation Act (English) of 1651, 
436. 

Neck'er, French minister, 509; dis- 
missed, 515. 

Nelson, Horatio, at Abukir Bay, 
540; at Trafalgar, 557. 

Netherlands^ the, the country, -^d-T^ ; 
the people, 363, 364 ; condition 
during the Middle Ages, 364; 
under Charles V, 364 ; under 
Philip II, 365-373 ; War of Inde- 
pendence, 366-374 ; submission of 
Catholic provinces (see Belgium^, 
370 ; independent union of seven 
Protestant provinces, 370; their 
Declaration of Independence, 371 ; 
Truce of 1609 with, 372-374 ; inde- 
pendent of Holy Roman Empire, 
392 ; wars with Louis XIV, 407- 
413; war with England, 436; 
Batavian Republic (created in 
1795), 552; kingdom of Holland, 
552 ; annexed to France, 568 ; 
kingdom of, formed, 583. 

Netherlands, Austrian, Catholic, 
Spanish. See Belgium. 

Netherlands, Protestant, United. 
See Netherlands. 

New Amsterdam, 444. 

Newfoundland, Cabot's landfall, 
337 ; England's title to, confinned, 

413- 
New France. See Canada. 
New Holland, 671 n. 9. 
New Learning. See Htimanism. 
"New Model" army, formed, 431, 

432. 



742 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



New South Wales, 671. 

Newton, Sir Isaac, 483. 

New Zealand, 671. 

Ney (na), Marshal, 577. 

Nibelungenlied (ne^bel-ung'en-let'), 
241. 

Ni-^ae'a, Church Council of, 15; 
captured by crusaders, 132. 

Nice (nes), ceded to France, 626. 

Nicholas I, Tsar, 654-656 ; II, 662 ; 
calls the Peace Conference, 701. 

Ni-cop'o-lis, battle of, 165. 

Niemen (ne^men), river, 558. 

Nihilists, 661, 662. 

Nika (ne^a) riot, the, 43. 

Nimeguen (nim'a-gen), Treaty of, 
408. 

Nineteenth century, character of its 
history, 290, 580, 581, 586, 587. 

Nineveh, battle of, 44. 

No'gi, Japanese general, 694 n. 29. 

Norman Conquest of England, 103- 
109 ; political and social results for 
England, 109; effects upon English 
language and literature, 216, 217. 

Normandy, origin of name, 72; in 
French history, 75, 76; dukes of, 
102. 

Normans, at home, loi, 102; in 
Italy and Sicily, 102, 103; in Eng- 
land, 103-109; as crusaders, 126, 
127. See Northmen. 

North German Confederation, 642, 

643- 

Northern countries, the. See Scan- 
dinavians and Calmar, Union of. 

Northmen, 71—76. See Scajtdina- 
vians. 

Norway, 583 ; See Calmar, Union of. 

Notables, Assembly of, 510. 

Notre Dame (no'tr dam), Paris, 
worship of Reason in, 530. 

No-va'ra, battle of, 624. 

Nova Scotia ceded to England, 413. 

Nov'go-rod, 174. 

Noyades (nwa-yad'), 534. 

Nystad (nii'stad). Peace of, 465. 

Oates (ots), Titus, 446. 
Ocean Epoch, 285. 
O'Connell, Daniel, 610. 
Odoacer, 7. 

Oktai (ok'ti), Mongol conqueror, 
161, 162. 



Old Sa'rum, 601. 
O'mar, caliph, 52 n. 6. 
Omeyyah (o-mryeh), 55 n. 9. 
Ommeiades (om-ma'yadz), dynasty 

of the, 55. 
O'Neill, Hugh, Earl of Tyrone, 359. 
Opium War, 672 n. 12. 
Orange Free State, 674, 675. 
Orange River Colony, 675. 
Orangemen, 452. 

Ordeals, among the Teutons, 37-39. 
Orders in Council (English), 561 

n. 17. . 
Orellana (o-ral-ya'na), Francisco de, 

286 n. II. 
Or^le-ans (Fr. pron. or-la-oh'), relief 

of, by Joan of Arc, 214. 
Orleans, Philippe, Duke of, regent, 

418. 
Osnabriick, 391. 
Os-tend', 374 n. 7. 
Ostrogoths, kingdom of the, 7, 8 ; 

destroyed by generals of Justin- 
ian, 8. 
Oswy, king of Northumbria, 18, 19. 
Oth-man', caliph, 52 n. 6. 
Othman I, Ottoman prince, 165. 
O-tran'to, 132. 
Otto I, the Great, restores the 

Empire, 69, 70. 
Otto, king of Greece, 655. 
Ottomans. See Turks. 
Ou'^den-ar'de, battle of, 412. 
Oxenstiem (oks'en-stem), 391. 
O-ya'ma, Field Marshal, 694. 

Paine, Thomas, 523. 

Palatinate, W^ar of the, 410, 411; 
devastation of, 411. 

Parimp-sests, 261 n. 6. 

Pamirs (pa-merz'), 684. 

Pa-na-ma', Scotch colony on isthmus 
of, 482 ; canal, 598. 

Papacy, origin of its temporal 
authority, 62 ; claims of primacy 
by the Roman bishops, 27, 28; 
circumstances that favored 
growth, 28-33; Concordat of 
Worms, 119; relations of, to the 
H. R. E., 111-113; revival of 
power in eleventh century, 113; 
under Gregory VII, 114-119; 
under Alexander III, 149 ; under 
Innocent III, 149, 150; effects 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 743 



the ruin of the Empire, 152, 153; 
under Boniface VIII, 153, 154; 
removal of papal seat to Avignon, 
155 ; the Great Schism, 155, 156; 
reforming Church Councils, 156; 
is still a spiritual theocracy, 157, 
158; end of temporal power of, 
630 ; relations with Italian gov- 
ernment, 630-632 ; with German, 
647 ; infallibihty of, 630 n. 5. See 
Popes. 

Papal States, annexed to France, 
567 ; revolutions in, 621 , French 
garrison in, 629; annexation to 
kingdom of Italy, 629. See 
Papacy. 

Paraphrase of the Scriptures, 20. 

Paris, Peace of (1763), 475, 491; 
(1783), 492; (1814), 576 n. 28; 
(1815), 57811.32; (1856), 657. 

Paris, siege of (1870), 646. 

Parish Councils Act, 605 n. 2. 

Parliament, English, creation of 
House of Commons, 203-205 ; 
Model Parliament, 204 n. 5 ; ef- 
fects upon, of Hundred Years' 
War, 214, 215; the Long Parlia- 
ment, 428-437 ; the Little Parlia- 
ment, 437; Convention, 448; union 
of English and Scotch ParUa- 
ments, 481-483. 

Parma, Alexander, Duke of, 370. 

Parr, Catherine, 345. 

Par'sees, the. See Fire- Worshipers. 

Parsifal (par'se-fal), poem of, 241. 

Par''the-no-pe'an Republic, 540, 541. 

Pascal, 417 n. 14. 

Patriarch, Russian, office abolished, 
462. 

Patricius (pa-trish'ius). See St. 
Patrick. 

Pavia (pa-ve'a), battle of, 321. 

Pax Romana, 125. 

Peace Conference at The Hague, 
701. 

Peace of God, 125. 

Peasants' Revolt, in England, 211, 
212. 

Peasants' War, 306. 

Pedro I, Emperor of Brazil, 615 n. 2. 

Pe-king', siege of embassies at, 690, 
691. 

P^re Duchesne (per dii-shan'), 531. 

Perry, Commodore, 687. 



Persia, conquest of, by Saracens, 52, 

53 ; Russian and English interests 

in, 683. 
Peru, Spanish conquest of, 287, 288 ; 

Spanish oppression of natives in, 

289 n. 14. 
Pestilence, the Great. See Black 

Death. 
Pestilence, in Justinian's reign, 44. 
Peter I, the Great, Tsar, 455-466; 

HI, 475. 
Peter the Hermit, legend of, 129; 

heads an expedition, 132. 
Peter of Lombard, Schoolman, 159 

n. 5. 
Petition of Right, 425. 
Petrarca (pa-trar^ka), Francesco. 

See Petrarch. 
Petrarch, as a humanist, 256-258; 

his feeling for the ruins of Rome, 

258; his ascent of Mount Ven- 

toux, 259 n. 4 ; his critical spirit, 

273- 

Philip I, the Handsome, king of 
Castile, 318; II, king of Spain, 
reign, 326-331 ; HI, expels Mo- 
riscos, 331, 332; war with Dutch, 
332; IV, 407; V, 411. 

Philip II, Augustus, king of France, 
in Third Crusade, 135; his quar- 
rel with Pope Innocent HI, 150 ; 
seizes English possessions in 
France, 202 ; IV, the Fair, his 
quarrel with Pope Boniface VIII, 
153, 154; summons the commons 
to the National Assembly, 222, 
223; destroys the order of the 
Templars, 223. 

Philip, Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, 

73- 
Philippines, discovered, 283 ; United 

States in, 686 n. 26. 
Philosophy, French, in eighteenth 

century, 505-508. 
Piacenza (pe-a-chen'za). Church 

Council at, 130. 
Piedmont. See Sardinia. 
Pilgrim Fathers, 354, 423. 
Pilgrimages, 122. 
Pious Fyind case, 701. 
Pippin III, king of the Franks, 61, 

62. 
Pisa (pe'za), 181 n. 7; Church 

Council of, 156. 



744 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Pitt, William, Earl of Chatham, 
489, 490. 

Pitt, William, opposition to Napo- 
leon, 544, 554, 555; prophecy 
concerning Napoleon, 570, 571. 

Pi-zar'ro, Francisco, 288. 

Plan-tag'e-net, House of, 199 n. i. 

Plassey, battle of, 490. 

Plato, quoted, 183 n. 11. 

Plev'na, siege of, 659. 

Poitiers (poi-terz'), battle of (1356), 
210, 211. 

Poland, Charles XII invades, 463 ; 
partitions of, 467 n. 7, 468 ; under 
Napoleon, 559 ; Russian kingdom 
of, 583 ; revolt in, 655. 

Politian (p6-lish'i-an), 262. 

Poltava (pol-ta'va), battle of, 464. 

Pom-e-ra'ni-a, Western, ceded to 
Sweden, 392 ; Eastern, ceded to 
Brandenburg, 392. 

Pompadour (p6n-pa-door'), Ma- 
dame de, 418. 

Pondicherry (pon-di-sher'i), found- 
ed, 413 n. 13; captured by Eng- 
lish and restored, 491 n. 15. 

Pope, Alexander, 483. 

Popes : Gregory I, 16, 30 n. 4 ; Leo I, 
the Great, 28, 29 ; Nicholas I, 28 ; 
Stephen II, 62 ; Leo III, 64 ; 
Gregory "VII, 114-119; Nicholas 
II, 113 n. 4; Urban II, 129, 130 ; 
Innocent III, 149, 150; Alexan- 
der III, 148, 149; Boniface VIII, 
153, 154; Urban VI, 156; Clem- 
ent VII (anti-pope), 156; Greg- 
ory IX, 156; Alexander V, 156; 
Martin V, 157; Nicholas V, 261, 
Julius II, 261 ; Leo X, 261 ; 
Alexander VI, 281 ; Julius II, 
336 ; Leo X, 301 ; Clement VII, 
340 ; Pius V, 356 ; Gregory XIII, 
380; Sixtus V, 356; Pius VI, 
540; Pius VII, at Napoleon's 
coronation, 551 ; prisoner, 567 ; 
Pius IX, 624 ; death, 630, n. 7 ; 
Leo XIII, 630 n. 7 ; Pius X, 630 
n. 7. See Papacy. 

Popish Plot, the, 446. 

Popular sovereignty, principle of, 
581. 

Port Arthur, ceded to Japan, 689; 
leased to Russia, 690 ; fortified by 
Russia, 693 ; siege of, 694. 



Porto Rico, 686 n. 26. 

Portugal, kingdom of, 141 ; annexed 
to Spain, 330 ; French invasion 
of, 563; revolution of 1820, 615 
n. 2 ; republic of, 615 n. 2. 

Portuguese colonies, early explora- 
tions, 278; in India, 281 ; in 
Brazil, 281 n. 5. 

Potato introduced into Europe, 
360. 

Pragmatic Sanction, 472. 

Prague (prag). Treaty of (1866), 
642. 

Prayer, Book of Common, 348. 

Pressburg (pres'borc), 555 n. 9. 

Prestonpans, battle of, 487. 

Pretender, the Young, 487. 

Pride's Purge, 432. 

Prime Minister, origin of, in Eng- 
land, 484, 485. 

Prince, the, by Machiavelli, 247, 

Printing, invention of, 263 ; in China, 
263. 

Privileges, abolition of, in France, 
515' 516. 

Protectorate in England, 438-440. 

Protestant Revolution, defined, 292. 
See Reformation. 

Protestants, origin of name, 308 ; 
divisions among, 309, 310. 

Protestation, the Great, 423. 

Proven9al (pro'vaiVsar') speech, 227. 

Provence (pro'voris''), 225, 323. 

Prussia, foundations of, laid by 
Teutonic Knights, 142 ; under 
the Great Elector, 469; becomes 
a kingdom, 470; in eighteenth 
century, 470-479; war with 
French Revolution, 520; war 
with Napoleon, 557, 558 ; regen- 
eration of, 571-573 ; gains at Con- 
gress of Vienna, 583 ; in Holy 
Alliance, 586; in Germanic Con- 
federation, 634-636 ; in Customs 
Union, 637 ; Revolution of 1848 
in, 638 ; war with Denmark, 640 ; 
with Austria, 641, 642; with 
France, 594-596, 643-645 ; forms 
North German Confederation, 
642, 643 ; head of new German 
Empire, 645-649. 

Public Safety, Committee of, first, 
525 ; second or Great, 527, 531 ; 
of Communists, 596. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 745 



Purgatory, 299, 300. 

Puritans, under Elizabeth, 357 ; rule 

of, 430-443 ; customs of, 449. 
Pym, John, 430. 
Pyramids, battle of the, 539. 
Pyrenees, Treaty of the, 404. 

Quebec, founded, 383 ; battle of, 

490. 
Quesnay (ka-na'), 508 n. 7, 
Quir'i-nal, the, 630 n. 6. 
Quito (ke'to), 288. 

Racine (ra-sen'), 417. 

Radetzky (ra-det'ske), 624. 

Raleigh (ra'li). Sir Walter, 360, 424. 

Ramillies (ra-me-ye'), battle of, 412. 

Raphael (raf'a-el), 268. 

Rastadt, Treaty of, 413. 

Ravaillac (ra-va-yak'), 384. 

Ravenna, 42. 

Raymond IV, count of Toulouse, 
132; VI, 142; VII, 143. 

Reason, worship of, 530. 

Reform Bill, English, of 1832, 601, 
602; of 1867, 604; of 1884, 604. 

Reformation, defined, 292 ; causes 
of, 292-295 ; precursors of, 295 • 
question of indulgences, 299-301 ; 
Luther, 301-306; reaction from, 
308-314; results of, 315, 316; in 
England, character of, 334, 335 ; 
the revolt from Rome, 341-345 ; 
the refoim under Edw^ard VI, 347- 
349; the reaction under Mary, 
349-351 ; reform completed un- 
der Elizabeth, 353 ; in France, 376. 

Regency, the French, 418. 

Renaissance (r^-na'sans'' : the italic 
e here has the obscure sound of e 
in novel), the, defined, 251 ; causes 
and antecedents, 251-254; the 
revival in Italy, 255-269; human- 
ism, 256-266; the artistic revival, 
266-269 ; general effetts, 269-274; 
relation to religious reform, 273. 
See Humanism. 

Renaissance in France, 323.. 

Restoration, English, 440, 441 ; 
French, 576, 578. 

Reuchlin (roich-len' or roich^in), 
humanist, 265, 298. 

Revenue of English crown settled, 
45i» 452. 



Revival of Learning. See Renais- 
sance. 

Revolution, Protestant, 292 ; Puri- 
tan, 430-443; of 1688, 448; In- 
dustrial, 493-495; American, 491, 
492 ; its influence, 508 ; French, 
of 1789, 500-542; its principles, 
580, 581 ; of July, 1830, 590, 591 ; 
of February, 1848, 591, 592; Bel- 
gian, of 1830, 591 ; German, of 
1830, 636, 637 ; of 1848, 637-639 ; 
Italian, of 1820, 620; of 1830, 
621; of 1848, 623, 624; Polish, of 
1830, 655 ; Portuguese, of 1820, 
615 n. 2;' Spanish, of 1820, 614, 
615. 

Revolutionary Tribunal, French, es- 
tablished, 525 ; work of, 528, 533. 

Rheims (remz), 214. 

Rhodes, Cecil, 676. 

Richard I, king of England, 135, 
136; III, 215. 

Richard of Cornwall, 237. 

Richelieu (resh-lye'), Cardinal, 384- 
386. 

Ridley, 350. 

Rienzi (re-en'ze), tribune of Rome, 
244-246. 

Rights, English Bill of, 450, 451. 

Rimini (re'me-ne), 62. 

River Epoch, 284. 

Rivoli (re'vo-le), battle of, 538 n. 27. 

Robert the Magnificent, Duke of 
Normandy, 103 

Roberts, Lord, 675. 

Robespierre (ro-bes-pye/), in Con- 
stituent Assembly, 514; in Con- 
vention, 523 ; in Committee of 
Public Safety, 527, 531, 532; death, 

534- _ _ . 

Rois faineants (rwa fa-na-on ), 10. 

Roland (ro-lon'), Madame, 529. 

Rowland, paladin, 63 n. 2. 

Rollo, Scandinavian chief, 75. 

Romagna (ro-man'ya), the, united 
with the Sardinian kingdom, 627. 

Roman Empire, restored in the 
West, by Charlemagne, 64, 65 ; 
renewed by Otto the Great, 69, 
70. See Eastern Empire and 
Holy Roman Empire. 

Roman law, revival of, 40, 41 ; Jus- 
tinian Code, 43. 

Roman Republic, 540, 624. 



746 INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Romance languages, 35. 
Romance nations, 34, 35. 
Ro-ma'nov or R5-ma'noff, House 

of, 455- 

Rome, relation of the fall of, to 
world history, 3 ; its bequest to 
civilization, 4 : sack of (1527), 321 ; 
capital of Italy, 629. 

Roncesvalles (ron-se-varies ; Sp. 
ron-thes-vaFyes), Pass of, 63 n. 2. 

Ros'a-mund, story of, ion. 5. 

Roses, Wars of the, 215, 216. 

Ross'bach, battle of, 474. 

Rouen (roo-oii'), 75. 

Rouget de Lisle (roo-zha' de lei), 
522 n. 13. 

Roundheads, 430. 

Rousseau (roo-s6'), 506, 507. 

Roussillon (roo'sel'yoh''), 225, 404. 

"Royal Touch," the, 421 n. 2. 

Rumania or Roumania (roo-ma'ni-a), 
660, 663. 

Rumelia or Roumelia (roo-meli-a), 
Eastern, 660 n. 8. 

Runnymede (rianTmed), 202. 

Rupert, Prince, 431. 

Ru'rik, Scandinavian chief, 73, 74, 
242. 

Russia, introduction of Christianity 
into, 21 ; receives elements of 
civilization from Constantinople, 
45 ; the Mongol invasion, 242 ; 
rise of Muscovy, 243 ; freed from 
the Mongols, 243 ; under Ivan the 
Terrible, 454, 455 ; under Peter 
the Great, 455-466; under Cath- 
erine the Great, 466-46S ; in Seven 
Years' War, 475 ; war with French 
Republic, 541 ; with Napoleon, 
573-575 ; gains at Congress of 
Vienna, 583 ; in Holy Alliance, 586; 
since French Revolution, 654- 
663'; Asiatic expansion of, 682-685. 

Russo-Japanese War, 693-695. 

Russo-Turkish War, of 1 828-1 829, 
654, 655; of 1877-1878,658-660. 

Ruy Diaz (de'ath), 233. 

Rys'wick, Treaty of, 411. 

Sadowa (sa'do-va), battle of, 642. 
St. Albans (al^banz), first battle of, 

215. 
St. An'selm, 193. 
St. Antony, 23. 



St. Bartholomew's Day, massacre 

of, 379, 380. 
St. Benedict, 24, 25. 
St. Ber^nard, preaches crusade, 134 ; 

controversy with Abelard, 193, 
St. Bernard, Great Pass, 545. 
St. Boniface (b6n''e-fass). See Win- 

frid. 
St. Co-lum^ba, 17. 
St. Dom'i-nic, 151. 
St. Francis, 151. 
St. Gall, monastery of, 17 n. 3. 
St. Gallus, monk, 17 n. 3 
St. Germain (san zher-mah'), Treaty 

of, 379- 

St. Helena, 579. 

St. John, Knights of. See Hos- 
pitalers. 

St. Louis, 140 n. 9. 

St. Patrick, 17. 

St. Paul's Cathedral, London, 445 
n. 15. 

St. Peter, 28. 

St. Peter's, Rome, 301. 

St. Petersburg, founded, 463. 

St. Quentin (san kon-tan'), battle of, 
328 n. 10. 

St. Sim'e-on Sty-lf tes, 23, 24. 

St. Wil'frid, 18. 

Sara-din, 135, 136. 

Sa-ler'no, 119. 

Salisbury, Gemot of, 106. 

Salisbury (salz'bu-ri), Marquis of, 
611. 

Sam-ar-cand', 162. 

San Marino (ma-re'no), 619. 

San Stef'a-no, Treaty of, 660 n. 7. 

Sans Souci (son soo-se'), 478. 

Saracens, name, 46 ; their con- 
quests, 52-54 ; their civilization, 
56-59. See Arabs and Moors. 

Sardinia, kingdom of, defeated by 
Bonaparte, 538; revolution of 
1820 in, 621 ; of 1848, 623, 624; 
in Crimean War, 625; war with 
Austria, 626, 627 ; annexations 
of territory, 627, 628 ; becomes 
kingdom of Italy, 628. 

Sa-vo-na-ro'la, Girolamo (je-r5'la- 
mo), 248, 249. 

Savoy, ceded to France, 626. 

Saxons, continental, subjugated by 
Charlemagne, 63. See Anglo- 
Saxons. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 747 



Saxony, becomes a kingdom, 559 
n. 14; part ceded to Prussia, 583. 

Scandinavians, conversion of, 21 ; 
as pirates and colonizers, 71, 
72 ; colonization of Iceland and 
Greenland, j^'^ discovery of 
America by, 73; saga literature 
of Iceland, jt, n, i ; in Russia, "jt, ; 
Danes in England, 74, 75 ; North- 
men in Gaul, 75 ; transformation 
of, 72 ; Norse factor in French 
history, 75, 76. See Cahnar, 
Union of. 

Scham^horst, 573. 

Schleswig (shlas'vic) or Sleswick, 
duchy of, 640 ; annexed to Prus- 
sia, 642. 

Schlesvi^ig-Holstein War, 640, 641. 

Schmalkaldic League, 323. 

Scholasticism, in conflict with hu- 
manism, 297, 298. ^QQ Schoolmen. 

Schoolmen, nature of their task, 
192 ; controversy of the Nom- 
inalists and Realists, 193 n. 4; 
the earlier Schoolmen, 192, 193 ; 
Abelard, 193, 194; the Schoolmen 
of the thirteenth century, 194 ; 
Albert the Great, 194 ; Thomas 
Aquinas, 194, 195 ; Duns Scotus, 
195; Roger Bacon, 195; last of the 
Schoolmen, 196; their services to 
intellectual progress, 196. 

Schwyz (shwits), 238. 

Scone (skoon). Stone of, 207. 

Scotland, wars with England, 206- . 
208 ; under James IV, 337, t^t^ 
n. 3 ; union of Scottish and Eng- 
lish crowns, 420; of their parlia- 
ments, 481-483 ; under Charles I, 
427, 428; Cromwell in, 435, 436. 

Scriptorium, 27. 

Scutage (sku'taj), defined, 203 n. 3. 

Sea Epoch, 284. 

Secularization of Church property, 
307; in France, 518. 

Sedan (se-don'), battle of, 595. 

Sedgemoor, battle of, 447 n. 16. 

Seeley, Professor J. R., quoted, 480, 
697. 

Seine (san), river, 75. 

Self-denying ordinance, 431, 432 
n. II. 

Sempach (sem'pak), battle of, 239 
n. 20. 



Sen-e-gar, 679. 
Separatists, 354. 
Sepoy Mutiny, 673. 
Sepoys, 490 n. 13. 

September Massacre in French Rev- 
olution, 522. 
Serfs, under feudal system, 84-86 ; 

' Russia emancipates, 657, 658. 
Ser-ve'tus, 312. 

Servia, independence of, 666 n. 8. 
Settlement, Act of, 452 n. 19. 
Se-vas't6-p5l, siege of, 657. 
Seven bishops, trial of the, 447, 448. 
Seven Weeks' War, 641, 642. 
Seven Years' War, 474-476, 488- 

491- , _ _ 
Sevigne (sa-ven-ya'), Madame de, 

417 n. 14. 
Seville (sevlil), 54. 
Seymour, Lord Henry, 357. 
Seymour, Jane, 345. 
Sforza (sfort'sa), Francesco, 247 

n. 23. 
Shaftes'bu-ry, third earl of, 505 n. 5. 
Shakespeare, 361. 

Shiahs (she'az), Moslem sect, 55 n. 9. 
Ship money, 427. 
Siberia, Russia in, 455, 685. 
Sicilian Vespers, 235 n. 17. 
Sicily, kingdom of. See Naples^ 

kingdom of. 
Sieyes(se-a-yas''), 514. 
Si-le'si-a, seized by Frederick the 

Great, 473. 
Simon Magus, 115 n. 5. 
Sim'o-ny, 11 5-1 17, 
Siraj-ud-Daula (se-raj'ood-dow''la), 

490 n. 14. 
Slave trade, African, beginning of 

the, 278 ; the Assiento, 481 ; Eng- 
land abolishes, 493. 
Slavery, abolished in English col- 
onies, 602 n. I. 
Slaves, number in Middle Ages, 

84 n. 6. 
Slavs, at opening of the Middle 

Ages, 6. See Russia. 
Smith, Sidney, 540. 
Smo-lensk', 574. 

Sobieski (soi^ye-ske), John, 409. 
Social Democrats, German, 707, 708. 
Socialism, in French Revolution of 

1848, 592 n. 2; of to-day, 649 n. 

II ; 707, 708. 



748 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Soissons (swas's6n^0» battle of, lo. 

Solferino (sol-fe-re'no), battle of, 
626. 

Sory-man, the Magnificent, Sultan, 
rival of Charles V, 320. 

Sophia, Electress of Hanover, 484. 

S6't5, Ferdinand de, 286 n. 11. 

South Sea Bubble, 485, 486. 

Spain, conquest of, by Saracens, 
54; during the Crusades, 141; 
early history, 229, 230; union of 
Castile and Aragon, 230; con- 
quest of Granada, 230, 231 ; influ- 
ence upon national character of 
the Moorish domination and wars, 
231 ; the Inquisition under Fer- 
dinand and Isabella, 232 ; under 
Charles V, 318-325 ; under Philip 
II, 326-331 ; under Philip III, 
331, 332; war with England, 356- 
359 ; war with Netherlands, 366- 
374 ; in the Napoleonic Era, 563, 
564, 566; since 1815, 614-618. 

Spanish-American War, 686 n. 26. 

Spanish colonies, beginnings, 28S ; 
Spain loses her continental Ameri- 
can dependencies, 615-617 ; loses 
her insular possessions, 618. 

Spanish Fury, the, 369. 

Spanish March, 63. 

Spanish Succession, War of the, 
41 1 -41 3 ; England's gains in, 481. 

Spenser, Edmund, 361. 

Spinning jenny invented, 494. 

Spires (Ger. Speyer), second diet 
of, 308. 

Stanley, Henry M., 667, 668. 

Star Chamber, court of, 426 n. 6. 

States-General, French, 223; of 
1789,511-513. 

Statute for the Burning of Heretics, 
219. 

Statute of Laborers, 21 t. 

Stein, Baron vom (stin), 572 n. 27, 
573. 

Stephen of Blois (blwa), king of 
England, 108. 

Stephenson, George, 705. 

Stirling, battle of, 207 n. 6. 

Stoessel (stes'sel), Russian general, 
694 n. 29. 

Strafford (Thomas Wentworth), 
Earl of, 426, 428. 

Stral'sund, siege of, 388 n. 3. 



Strasburg (Ger. Strassburg ; Fr. 
Strasbourg), seized by Louis XIV, 
408, 409. 

Strassburg (stras'borG), oath of, 
69 n. 6. 

Streltsi, disbanded, 461. 

Stuart, Henry, Lord Damley, 355. 

Stuart, House of, in England, 420. 

Sty-li''tes, Simeon, 23, 24. 

Sudan (soo-dan'), 677, 679. 

Suez Canal, 597. 

Sully (suH), Duke of, 383. 

Sun'na, the, 52. 

Siin'nites, Moslem sect, 55 n. 9. 

Supremacy, Act of, under Henry 
VIII, 342; under Elizabeth, 353. 

Supreme Being, worship of, 532. 

Surat (sooraf), English at, 423; 
French at, 413 n. 13, 423. 

Sweden, in Thirty Years' War, 389- 
391 ; gain in Peace of West- 
phalia, 392; under Charles XII, 
462, 463, 464 ; union with Norway, 
583 n. 3. See Calmar, Union 
of. 

Swift, Jonathan, 483. 

Swiss Confederation, the, rise of, 
238, 239 ; independent of Holy 
Roman Empire, 392 ; French 
intervention in, 540 ; as a federal 
state, 646 n. 8, 698. 

Swiss Guards, of Tuileries, 521, 
522 n. 14. 

Switzerland. See Swiss Confeder- 
ation. 

Sy-a'gri-us, 10. 

Sybel (se'bel), quoted, 639. 

Syria, conquest of, by Saracens, 
52. 

Taj Mahal (tazh ma-hal'), the, 162. 

Talleyrand (tal'i-rand), at the Res- 
toration, 576. 

Tam-er-lane'. See Timur. 

Tancred (tangOcred), 132. 

Tees (tez), river, 105. 

Tell, William, legend of, 239. 

Templars, order of the, origin, 133 
n. 5; abolition of, 223, 224. 

Temple of Peace, the, 701. 

Terror, Reign of, 527-535. 

Terrorism in Russia, 662. 

Test Act, 445, 446 n. 15a, 606. 

Tetzel, John, 301. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 749 



Teutonic Knights, order of the, 
origin, 134 ; in Baltic region, 142 ; 
property secularized, 307. 

Teutons, capacity for improvement, 
4; kingdoms established by, 7- 
13; their conversion, 14-22; fu- 
sion with the Latins, 34-41 ; per- 
sonality of Teutonic laws, 36, ^7 '•> 
ordeals among, 37-39. 

The-od'o-ric, king of the Ostrogoths, 
7,8. 

Thessaly, 655 n. 2. 

Thiers (tyer), 595, 596. 

Third Estate, the, beginnings of, 
in the towns, 185, 186; French, 
under the Bourbons, 503-505 ; in 
States-General, 51 1-5 13. 

Thirty Years' War, the, 387-394. 

Thomas Becket, 200, 201 ; shrine 
destroyed, 343. 

Thomas a Kem'pis, 297 n. i. 

Thor, German deity, 16. 

Thorvaldsen (tor'vald-zen), 522 n. 14. 

Tiberine Republic, of 1798, 540, 
541 ; of 1848, 624. 

Tiers Etat (tyar'za'ta'' ; Eng. pron. 
terz'a-ta'^). See Third Estate. 

Tilly, 388, 390. 

Tilsit, Treaty of, 558-560. 

Tim-buk'tu, 679. 

Timur (tl-moor'), Mongol conqueror, 
162. 

Tintoretto (tin-to-ret'to), 268 n. 14. 

Titian (tish'an), 268. 

Tobacco, introduced into Europe, 
360 n. 7. 

Todleben (tot'la-ben), 657. 

T5'go, Japanese admiral, 694 n. 29. 

Toleration, religious, influence upon, 
of the Protestant Reformation, 
.316, 394. 

Tories,the party of conservatism, 602. 

Toul (tool), 392. 

Toulon (too-lon^, siege of, 536 n. 25. 

Tournament (toor'na-ment), the, 96, 

97- _ 

Tours (toor), battle of, 54. 

Toussaint Louverture (too-sari'loo- 
ver-tiir'), 546 n. 2. 

Tower of London, 106. 

Towns, effects upon, of Crusades, 
144 ; suffer from barbarian in- 
vasion, 1 69 ; rapid growth in tenth 
and eleventh centuries, 169, 170; 



status of the chartered towns, 
171, 172; their industrial life, 
172 ; they enter the feudal system, 
170; their revolt, 172; towns in 
Germany, 173-175; in Italy, 175- 
183 ; their services to civilization, 
183-186; their representatives in 
national assemblies, 185, 186 ; cen- 
ters of new intellectual life, 186. 
See Hanseatic League and Italian 
city-republics. 

Tow'ton Field, battle of, 215. 

Traf-al-gar', naval battle of, 557; 
importance of, 561. 

Trans-Sibertan Railway, 685. 

Transvaal, the, 674, 675 ; becomes 
Transvaal Colony, 675. 

Trek, The Great, 674. 

Trent, Church Council of, 310, 311. 

Trieste (tre-est'), 653. 

Triple Alliance, of 1668, 319 n. i ; 
of 1882, 648. 

Troppau (trop'pou), Congress of, 
615 n. I. 

Trou'ba-dours, the, 227, 228. 

Trouveurs (troo'ver'^), the, 228, 229. 

Troyes (trwa). Treaty of, 213. 

Truce of God, 125, 126; proclaimed 
by Council of Clermont, 131. 

Tsar, title assumed, 455. 

Tudor, House of, 334 n. i. 

Tudor, Owen, 206. 

Tuileries (twe'le-riz), 524. 

Tunis, French protectorate, 678. 

Turanians. See Mongols and Turks. 

Turgot (tiir-g5'), 508 n. 7, 509. 

Turks, Ottoman, beginnings of their 
empire, 164; their conquests, 165- 
167 ; they capture Constantinople, 
166 ; check to their arms, 167 ; 
wars with Philip II, 329, 330 ; with 
Austria, 409 ; with Catherine the 
Great, 466 ; with Bonaparte, 540 ; 
with Greece, 654 n. i ; with Russia 
(i828-i829),654,655;(i85i-i856), 
656, 657; (1877-1878), 658-660. 

Turks, Seljuk, 123 ; power broken, 
129, 143. 

Tuscany, union with Sardinia, 627. 

Two Sicilies. See Naples^ King- 
dom of. 

Tyburn, 443. 

Tyler, Wat, 212. 

Tyrone (ti-ron'). Earl of, 359. 



750 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 



Uitlanders (oit'land-erz), 675. 

Ukraine (u'kran), 464. 

Urfi-las, apostle of the Goths, 14. 

Ulm (oolm), 555. 

Ulster, plantation of, 423, 424, 

Umbria, union with Sardinia, 628. 

Uniformity, Act of, under Edward 

VI, 349 ; under Elizabeth, 353. 
Union (parliamentary) of England, 

with Scotland, 4S 1-483; with 

Ireland, 609. 
Union, The Interparliamentary, 701, 

703. 

United Provinces. See Netherlands. 

United States, indep'endence of, 
492; War of 181 2, 562; Monroe 
Doctrine, 616, 617 ; expansion of, 
685-687. 

Universities, rise of the, 187, 188; 
faculties, 188 n. i ; "Nations "in, 
189 ; students and student life, 
189 ; studies and methods of 
instruction, 191. See Schoolmen. 

Unterwalden (oon'ter-val'^den), 238. 

Ural (oo'ral) Mountains, 455. 

Uri (oo'ri), 238. 

U-to'pi-a, More's, 346, 347. 

Utrecht (u'trekt). Union of, 370 ; 
Peace of, 413. 

Valla, Laurentius, 273. 

Valladolid (val-ya-tho-lethO, 365. 

Valmy (val-me'), battle of, 523. 

Valois (val-wa'), House of, 224 n. 
13, 376 n. I ; history of France 
under the mediaeval Valois sov- 
ereigns, 224-227 ; in the sixteenth 
century, 376-381. 

Vandals, kingdom of the, 9; de- 
stroyed by Belisarius, 9. 

Vane, Sir Henry, 434, 436; death, 

443- 

Vassy (va-seO> massacre of, 377, 378. 

Vatl-can, relations to France, 547, 
548 n. 3. 

Vauban (vo-bon^, 407. 

Vaudois (v6-dwa'), 323. 

Vaux (vo), Pierre de, 323 n. 6. 

Vendee (voii-da'). La, 526. 

Ve-ng'tia, ceded to Austria, 538, 
539 ; joined to Napoleon's king- 
dom of Italy, 555 ; becomes part 
of the new kingdom of Italy 
(1866), 628. 



Venice, takes part in Fourth Cru- 
sade, 136, 137 ; sketch of history, 
1 79-1 8 1 ; ceremony of wedding 
the Adriatic, 180; her "Arsenal," 
180, 181. 

Venice, Peace of, 149. 

Ventoux (vori-too'). Mountains, 259 
n. 4. 

Ver-dun', Treaty of, 68, 69. 

Vergniaud (vern-yo'), 527 n. 18. 

Verona (va-ro'na). Congress of, 
615 n. I. ^ 

Veronese (va-ro-na'za), 268 n. 14. 

Versailles (ver-salz'; Fr. pron. ver- 
say'), palace of, 415. 

Vervins(ver-van'), Treaty of, 382 n. 5. 

Vespucci, Amerigo (ves-poot'che, 
a-ma-re'go), 280. 

Victor Emmanuel I, king of Sar- 
dinia, reactionary policy of, 620 ; 
abdication of, 621 ; II, 624 ; king 
of Italy, 627, 628 ; III, 629 n. 4. 

Vienna (vi-en'a ; Ger. Wien), siege 
of (1683), 409 ; Congress of, 577, 
581-585. 

Villafranca (vel-la-frang^a), Peace 
of, 627. 

Villain. See Serfs. 

Vincennes (van-sen'), France, 550. 

Virginia, origin of name, 360. 

Visconti (ves-kon'te), family of the, 
247 n. 23. 

Visigoths, kingdom of the, 8, 9. 

VladPi-mir the Great, of Russia, 21. 

Vogelweide (fo'^el-vi'de), Walther 
von der, 241. 

Voltaire (vol-ter^), 478, 505, 506. 

Wager of battle. See Ordeals. 
Wagram (va'gram), battle of, 566. 
Wal-den'ses, 323. 
Waldo (val-do'), Peter, 323 n. 6. 
Wales, conquest of, 205, 206. 
Waliszewski (va-li-shev'ski), quoted, 

456. 

Wallace, Sir William, 207. 

Wallachia (wo-la'ki-a), partial inde- 
pendence of, 655 ; in kingdom of 
Rumania, 660 n. 8. 

Wallenstein (woFen-stin ; Ger. pron. 
val'len-stln), 388, 389, 39:. 

Walpole, Sir Robert, 485. 

Walsingham, Sir Francis, 353. 

Walter the Penniless, 132. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 751 



"Wardship, feudal right of, 84 n. 4. 

Warsaw, Grand Duchy of, formed, 
559 ! given to Russia, 583. 

Wartburg (vart'boorG), Luther at, 
305, 306. 

Waterloo, battle of, 578. 

Watt, James, 494. 

Wed'more, Treaty of, 74. 

Wei-hai-wei, 690. 

Wellesley, Sir Arthur. See Wel- 
lington. 

Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke 
of, in Portugal, 564; at Water- 
loo, 578. 

Wentworth, Thomas. See Straf- 
ford. 

Weser (va'zer), river, 392. 

Wesley, Charles, 487. 

Wesley, John, 487. 

Western Empire (Teutonic). See 
Charlemagne and Holy Roman 
Empire. 

Westphalia, kingdom of, 560; 
Peace of, 391-393- 

Whigs, representatives of Liberal- 
ism, 602. 

Whitby, Council of, 18, 19. 

Whitefield (hwit'feld), George, 487. 

Wieland (ve'lant), 565. 

Wilberforce, William, 493, 

Wilhelmina, of Bayreuth, on Peter 
the Great, 459 n, 3. 

William I, the Conqueror, king of 
England, his youth, 103 ; prepares 
to invade England, 104 ; victory 
at Hastings, 104 ; his reign, 105- 
108 ; II, the Red, 108 ; III, 449, 

450-453- 
William I, the Silent, stadtholder, 
mentioned, 366 ; his character, 
367, 368; his "Apology," 371; 
his death, 372; II, 434 n. 13; 
III, 448; king of England, 449, 
450-453- 



William I, German Emperor, as 

king of Prussia, 639, 640, 644 ; 

Emperor, 646 ; death, 648 ; II, 

648, 649. 
Wimpheling, Jacob, 297 n. i. 
Windmills, introduced into Europe 

by Crusades, 144. 
Win'f rid, apostle of Germany, 20, 30. 
Wink'el-ried, Arnold of, 239 n. 20. 
Wisby (wiz'bi), 174. 
Wit'an, the, 103 n. i ; becomes the 

English Parliament, 109. 
Wit'^e-na-ge-mot'. See VVitan. 
Wittenberg, Luther at, 306. 
Wo'den, German god, 16. 
Wolfe, James, 490. 
Wolsey, Cardinal, minister of 

Henry VIII, T,y], 338 ; death, 340. 
Worcester, battle of, 436. 
Workshops, national, in France, 

592 n. 2. 
Worms (vorms). Concordat of, 119 ; 

Diet of, 304, 305. 
Wren, Sir Christopher, 445 n. 15. 
Wiirtemberg (viirt'tem-bero), king- 
dom of, 556; in German Empire, 

646. 
Wycliffe (wik'lif), John, 218, 219. 

Xavier (zav'i-er), Francis, 314. 
Xeres (ha-res'), battle of, 54. 

Yezd, city, 53 n. 7. 

York, House of, 199 n. i. See Roses, 

Wars of the. 
Yuste (yoos'ta), 325. 

Zaandam (zan-dam'), 460. 
Zambesi (zam-be'ze), river, ()']6. 
Zend-Avesta, the, 52. 
Zollverein (tsorfer-in'^), 637. 
Zorn'dorf (tsorn'dorf ), battle of, 474. 
Zwingli (zwingle), Huldreich, 309. 
Zwinglians, 309. 



SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER 

CHAPTER XLV 
THE WORLD WAR (1914-1918) 

I. Causes of the War and Train of 
Preceding Events 

763. The War's Place in History. — In the last days of July 
and the early days of August, 19 14, — henceforth one of the 
memorable dates of history, — there broke out in Europe a war 
which at once involved five of the great powers of that continent 
and ultimately almost the whole of the civilized world. Before 
passing to an investigation of the fundamental causes of this 
titanic conflict, we must first note carefully its relation to the 
tendencies and world-wide movements which we have traced in 
the foregoing pages. 

The events of this great war will appear in their right perspective 
and its place in history will be revealed only when it is viewed as 
the culmination of the Political Revolution which began in the 
seventeenth century in England and of which the outstanding 
fact before this upheaval of 19 14 was the French Revolution. 

As we have seen, one of the great principles proclaimed by the 
Revolution was the principle of popular sovereignty, of government 
by the people.^ 

Another of the influential ideas promulgated by the revolutionists 
-of 1789 was the doctrine of nationality. This demands that every 
nation, that is, every considerable group whose members are kindred 
in blood or who have the same traditions, ideals, and aspirations, 
shall be free to live its own life, to be master of its own destiny. 
The principle forbids that one race should rule over another race. 

Now, these principles of the Revolution are, as we shall see, 
the essential principles for which the nations that fought against a 

1 See sec. 644. 
619.1 i 



ii THE WORLD WAR 

Prussianized Germany and her allies inxthe World War contended. 
This fact determines the place in history of the great conflict. It 
is the latest act — and, if the aims, purposes, and ideals of the 
nations that fought against Germany and her allies are ultimately 
attained, as it appears that they will be, we may hope the final act 
— in the drama of what we have called the Political Revolution. 

764. Autocracy versus Democracy — The place in history which 
we assign to .the World \\'ar will be seen to be its real place if we 
look more closely, as we shall now proceed to do, at some of the 
underlying causes of the great conflict. 

During the nineteenth century the revolutionary idea of govern- 
ment by the people made conquest, as we have seen, of a great 
part of Europe. Unhappily there were in Central Europe two 
states, Prussia and Austria, which repudiated the liberal principles 
of the Revolution and, under the mask of parliamentary forms, 
remained the upholders of the old discredited regime of autocratic 
government. Of these t\vo states Prussia, under the House of 
Hohenzollem, was by far the most important and representative. 
It alone claims our attention here. In an earlier chapter we saw 
how the royal House of Hohenzollem was raised by Prince Bis- 
marck, through a poHcy of " blood and iron," at once to the head- 
ship of Germany and the Imperial dignity.^ We also saw how the 
young Emperor William II, the third of the Hohenzollems to wear 
the Imperial crown, shortly after the beginning of his reign, abruptly 
dismissed the Imperial Chancellor, Prince Bismarck, and then began 
a very personal rule. The following utterances of the Emperor will 
reveal the spirit and temper of his government : "I alone am 
master here ; who opposes me I shall crush " (a sentiment ex- 
pressed by the young Emperor at the time he " dropped his pilot," 
Prince Bismarck). " We Hohenzollems take our crown from God 
alone, and to God alone we are responsible in the fulfillment of 
duty." ^ " The spirit of the Lord has descended upon me because 

2 See Chapter XL. 

3 This was not merely Emperor William's personal interpretation of the German 
Constitution. The eminent German historian Eduard Meyer has said, " The power 
of Germany's monarchs must be unlimited, and they cannot therefore be responsible 
to man but to God alone." 



IMPERIALISM VERSUS NATIONALISM iii 

I am the Emperor of the Germans. I am the instrument of the 
Almighty, his sword, his agent. Woe and death to all those who 
oppose my will." * 

This is exactly the language of the divine-right Stuarts of Eng- 
land and the pre-revolutionary Bourbons of France, whose impious 
assumptions and cruel tyranny did so much to provoke the English 
and the French Revolution.^ The ideal of government and the 
mode of thinking shown by these declarations was one of the 
deeper causes of the World War — for civilization cannot exist 
half autocratic and half democratic- — and was what made it possi- 
ble for President Wilson, when, in the third year of the unprece- 
dented conflict, the United States entered the war, to define it 
as fundamentally a struggle between democracy and autocracy 
and to declare our aim and purpose in entering the war to be " to 
make the world safe for democracy." ^ In doing this we were but 
carrying on to completion our part of the work so far advanced 
by the men of 1789. 

, 765. Imperialism versus Nationalism. — Again, the relation of 
the World War to the Revolution of 1789 is revealed in the part 
which violations of the second great principle of the revolutionists, 
namely, the principle of nationality, played in precipitating the 
great catastrophe of 1 9 1 4 and in giving such complexity and world- 
wide range to the struggle. The most far-reaching in its conse- 
quences of these violations of the sentiment of nationalism was 
the tearing away from France of Alsace-Lorraine by the victorious 
Germans ai the end of the Franco-Prussian War (sec. 7 1 4). During 
the forty years between the close of that war and the outbreak of 
the later conflict the German rule in these provinces was harsh 
and tactless. The freedom of the press was denied, the use of 
the French language was restricted, and every effort was made 

4 Proclamation by the Emperor to the army of the East at the beginning of the 
World War. 

5 Cf. sees. 440 and 458. 

6 That this was the real character of the war was at first obscured by the fact that 
autocratic Russia was an ally of the liberal governments of Western Europe ; but 
when, in 1917, the Romdnov dynasty was overthrown and Russia proclaimed a 
republic, the real issues involved became clear. 



iv THE WORLD WAR 

to Germanize the people and lead them to forget France. As a 
result the provinces were in a chronic state of unrest and protest. 
Thousands of the young men fled the country and joined the 
French army. 

All this tended to keep alive in France the deep feeling of 
resentment towards Germany for the great wrong of 187 1. So 
potent a factor were the feelings nourished by this bitter root — 
combined with the fear of further mutilation — in bringing on the 
disaster of 19 14 that it is not too much to say that when Bismarck 
permitted Alsace-Lorraine to be taken from France he sowed the 
seeds of a new war between Germany and France. This dismember- 
ment of France was the direct and primary cause of the alignment 
of the great powers^ of Europe in' two opposing alliances'^ and of 
that constant growth of armaments which made all Europe for 
more than a generation before 19 14 an armed camp. 

Aside from Alsace-Lorraine there were in Europe and Asian 
Turkey various nations and fragments of nations which at an 
earlier time, through the fortunes of war or the crimes of kings, 
had lost their independence and were being held in hated and 
oppressive subjection by alien races. Every one of these nations 
or parts of nations, — Poles, Rumanians, Slavs, Greeks, Italians, 
Armenians, and Arabs, — of which we shall speak later, became 
either an active cause in bringing on the World War or in widening 
its range and adding to its manifold phases and problems. 

766. German Ideas and Doctrines. — We have seen how pro- 
found an influence philosophic ideas exerted upon the develop- 
ment and course of the French Revolution (sec. 558). Even more 
determinative in inaugurating and giving character to the great 
war of 19 1 4 were the pernicious doctrines inculcated by the 
German ruling class and leaders in German thought. Among 
these ideas was the conception that the German people are a 
superior race ordained to world dominion. This idea of an elect 
race has played a great role in history. The ancient Hebrews, 
the Greeks, the Romans, each thought of themselves as a chosen 
people. But these were primitive peoples of the early world. It 

7 See sees. 715 and 769. 



GERMAN IDEAS AND DOCTRINES v 

was not thought that this naive notion could find a place in the 
sober thoughts and reasoned convictions of a civilized people of 
to-day. But, somehow, during the decades following the Franco- 
Prussian War of 1870 and the establishment of Prussian ascendancy 
in the Empire, it did become a fixed element in the German stock 
of ideas. What made this notion of German superiority in race and 
culture a menace to the security and peace of the world was that 
those entertaining this idea conceived it to be the mission of the 
German people to spread the superior German Kultur over the 
earth by force of arms if necessary, and thus to make Germany 
the " mother country of the future civilization of the world." 

Another dangerous German teaching was that war is a necessary 
and divinely ordained factor in human history. " War," said the 
militarist Bernhardi, " is not only a biological law but a moral 
obligation, and as such an indispensable factor in civilization." 
" War," said Marshal von Moltke, " is an element of the order of 
the world established by God. . . . Without war the world would 
stagnate and lose itself in materialism." It was this philosophy of 
war which, blinding the German people to the insanity and crimi- 
nality of aggressive war, had much to do in letting loose upon the 
world the immeasureable calamity of the war of 19 14. 

Still another sinister doctrine taught by many German philoso- 
phers is that the state in its relation to other states is not bound 
by the rules of morality. " Right and wrong," says an eminent 
German authority, " are notions needed in civil life only." " It 
will always conduce to the glory of Machiavelli," said the famous 
Treitschke, professor of histoiy at the University of Berlin, at 
whose feet multitudes of German youth for many years received 
instruction in history and imbibed ideas of public morality, "... that 
he has freed the state and its morality from the precepts of 
the Church." ^ This means that war may be waged without 
regard to treaties or international law, without sentiment, pity, 
or mercy. " For the sake of the Fatherland," declared Professor 
Treitschke, "the natural sentiment of humanity is to be sup- 
pressed." Translated into practice in the World War by the 

8 See sec. 270. 



vi THE WORLD WAR 

German militarists, this monstrous doctrine that war may be waged 
without regard to the restraints of law and conscience produced the 
German policy of ruthlessness and frightfulness which, more than 
any other one thing, aroused and arrayed against the German 
government the greater part of the civilized world. 

Having now indicated some of the root causes of the great war, 
and drawn attention to some German ideas and teachings which 
were at the bottom of the lawless and inhuman methods of the 
German military authorities in the conduct of the war, we will in the 
following pages trace the course of events that during the early 
years of the twentieth century mark the drift of Europe towards 
the abyss of the great catastrophe. 

767. The Berlin-to-Bagdad Railway. — As has already been 
seen, by the end of the nineteenth century and before Germany was 
ready to enter the field as a competitor for colonies and for indus- 
trial opportunities outside of Europe, the other leading European 
nations, which had earlier achieved national unity, had acquired 
and partitioned among themselves the most of the desirable lands 
of the world open to European colonization or business enter- 
prises.^ There were left, however, three states — Turkey, Persia, 
and Morocco — which because of their backward or decadent con- 
dition were looked upon by the great industrial nations of Europe 
as inviting fields for economic exploitation and perhaps ultimately 
for actual political control. 

Of these three states Turkey first drew the attention of the 
Germans. Early in the twentieth century Germany secured con- 
cessions from the Ottoman Porte for the construction of a railway 
across Asia Minor and Mesopotamia to Bagdad, and thence to some 
point on the Persian Gulf. In connection with lines in Europe this 
road was to give rail communication between Berlin and Bagdad, 
and hence is generally known as the Berlin-to-Bagdad Railway. 

The purposes of this road were twofold: (i) to open up to 
German trade and business enterprise Asia Minor and Mesopo- 
tamia, lands of vast natural resources, which had nourished the 
great civilizations of the early world ; and (2) to make it possible 
9 See Chapter XLIII. 



THE BERLIN-TO-BAGDAD RAILWAY vii 

for Germany in the event of war to menace British interests in 
Egypt and India. In time the political and military aims of the 
project came to take precedence of the purely economic purposes. 

The Berlin-to- Bagdad Railway project affords an explanation of 
the unnatural alliance between Germany and Turkey, an alliance 
which became an important factor in the World War. The realiza- 
tion of the scheme required, of course, the friendly cooperation of 
the Turkish government and the good will of the Mohammedan 
world. In 1898 Emperor William II undertook a pious pilgrimage 
to Palestine. In a famous address made at Damascus he said: 
" May his Majesty the Sultan, as well as the three hundred mil- 
lion Moslems who venerate him as their Khalif, be assured that 
the German Emperor is their friend forever." Thus were the 
Mohammedans of Egypt, India, Central Asia, and North Africa, 
restless perhaps under British or Russian or French rule, told to 
whom they should look as a friend and deliverer. 

The location of the Asian stretch of the Berlin-to- Bagdad Rail- 
way should be carefully noted. It follows closely the ancient mili- 
tary and trade route between the East and the West. Control of 
this highway • gives control of Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, Syria, 
Palestine, and Egypt. It is this which made the German project 
a matter of such international concern and rendered it such a 
factor in bringing on this world conflict and in extending the 
operations of the war into Mesopotamia and Palestine. 

Great Britain was especially concerned. Alarmed at the pros- 
pect of Germany's getting a foothold at the head of the Persian 
Gulf, within striking distance of her sea route to India, she at first 
threw obstacles in the way of the carrying out of the project. The 
matter, however, was finally adjusted, and Great Britain gave up 
her opposition to the German enterprise ; but the long-continued 
friction between the two governments had engendered mutual 
suspicions and animosities, which, deepened by later conflicts of 
interests, formed one of the contributing causes of the World War. 
As the war progressed, the important relation of the Berlin-to- 
Bagdad Railway to the German scheme for world dominion became 
more and more clearly revealed. 



Viii THE WORLD WAR 

768. Germany becomes a Sea Power. — Before the close of the 
nineteenth century Germany, already possessing a dangerous mili- 
tary power, turned her attention toward the sea. The kaiser de- 
clared : "Our future lies on the water. . . . The trident must pass 
into our hands." A great German merchant marine was created, 
and a vast and lucrative overseas trade developed. In the making, 
the carrying, and the selling of goods the Germans came into 
successful competition with the English exporters and traders in 
all parts of the world. To protect her extended commerce in the 
event of war and to further her ambitious world policy, Germany 
began the creation of a navy. At the opening of the twentieth 
century her war fleet was second only to that of Great Britain. ^*^ 
The British government became alarmed. The insular security of 
Great Britain seemed to be menaced, for, with only a small army, 
she must hold command of the seas to be safe. A keen competition 
between the two nations in the construction of warships began. In 
this rivalry there was a distinct menace to world peace. 

769. The Triple Entente, or Good Understanding, between Great 
Britain, France, and Russia. — Germany's constant increase of 
her navy, and her ambition for world domination as disclosed by 
the utterances of the German militarists and ruling classes, deep- 
ened the fears of Great Britain and caused her to abandon her policy 
of keeping aloof, in " splendid isolation," from continental alliances, 
and to enter into what was in effect, though not in name, a 
defensive alliance with France and Russia. In 1904 she settled 
all her long-standing troubles with France and reached a cordial 
understanding with her. This arrangement was a matter of world- 
wide importance, for though it was purely a measure of defense 
against the German menace, Germany claimed it was evidence 
of unfriendly intentions and a plot for her " encirclement " and 
destruction. Henceforth her hatred of Great Britain became ever 
more fixed and implacable. 

Three years after Great Britain had reached her good under- 
standing with France, she effected with Russia an adjustment of 
all their conflicting interests in Asia and elsewhere. One of the 
10 The Kiel Canal was opened in 1895. 



THE TRIPLE ENTENTE ix 

most important of the disputes settled was that concerning Persia, 
the second of the "decadent" states already mentioned. A revo- 
lution here having resulted in a condition of anarchy which seemed 
to justify outside intervention, Great Britain and Russia proceeded 
to. partition the country, Russia taking as her special sphere of 
influence the northern provinces and Great Britain the south- 
west region. Both governments mutually agreed to respect the 
" integrity " and " independence " of Persia. 

This accord between these two ancient rivals was a matter of 
tremendous import in world history, of even greater import than 
the French and British accord. Great Britain now gave up all 
opposition to Russia's ambition to secure control of the waterways 
of the Bosporus and Dardanelles. It was Germany now, with 
her ambitious projects in Asian Turkey and her Bagdad Railway, 
that had become a menace to British possessions in both Egypt 
and India. Great Britain's earlier opposition to Russian purposes 
was now directed against German plans of expansion eastward. 

These settlements and arrangements completed what is known 
as the Triple Entente, or good understanding, between Great Britain, 
France, and Russia.^^ The six great powers^ were now aligned in 
two groups, the members of each group so bound together by 
alliances or understandings that a conflict arising between any two 
states of the opposing groups was almost certain to bring on a 
general European war. So this very expedient — the forming of 
alliances — whereby the European governments sought to maintain 
the balance of power and to preserve the peace of the world was 
the very thing that made so extended and so colossal the disaster 
that overwhelmed Europe in 19 14. 

770. The First Moroccan Crisis (1905). — Morocco, the third of 
the "decadent" states that seemed marked out for commercial 
penetration or political absorption by their more vigorous and enter- 
prising neighbors, simultaneously with the formation of the Triple 

11 France and Russia had drawn together and formed in 1891 a defensive alliance 
known as the Dual Alliance. 

12 The Triple Alliance, it will be recalled, embraced Germany, Austria-Hungary, 
and Italy. 



X THE WORLD WAR 

Entente became the subject of a serious international controversy. 
The collision of interests here was between Germany on the one 
hand and France and Great Britain on the other. France had set 
her heart on the possession of this country in order to round out 
her African empire.-^^ When, in 1904, Great Britain and France 
entered into a mutual good understanding, this was one of the 
things settled. An agreement was reached whereby France gave 
Great Britain a free hand in Egypt in return for a free hand for 
herself in Morocco. 

The next year the German Emperor landed in his yacht, the 
Ifohenzollern, at the Moroccan port of Tangier and made addresses 
to the German traders and merchants there which were meant for 
other ears besides theirs. His utterances were notice to Great 
Britain and France that in all arrangements and conventions re- 
specting the remaining free states of the world Germany must be 
consulted. This was merely a reaffirmation of a previous declara- 
tion that nothing of importance in the world at large should 
be arranged without the consent of Germany and the German 
Emperor. 

France, — though she felt that Germany's intervention was 
unjustifiable, — being uncertain of the armed support of Great 
Britain and knowing that her other ally, Russia, because of the 
defeat she had just suffered at the hands of Japan (sec. 753) was 
powerless to help her, made humiliating concessions to Germany ^^ 
and agreed to the calling of an international convention to review 
the whole matter. The outcome of this meeting ^^ was favorable 
for France ; the representatives of the nations recognized her spe- 
cial and superior interest in Morocco and commissioned her to 
maintain order in that country. 

This Moroccan affair is a landmark in history, one of the out- 
standing facts of the decade preceding the outbreak of the great 
war. The crisis created by Germany's manner of intervention had, 



13 See sec. 738 and map after page 668. 

14 The French Premier, Delcasse, who had carried on the negotiations with the 
British government, was by Germany's threat of war forced to resign. 

15 The Convention of Algeciras, 1906. 



I 



SOME FACTORS OF THE BALKAN PROBLEM xi 

it is true, been passed safely, but important consequences resulted 
from her action. The good understanding between Great Britain, 
France, and Russia was cemented. It now became something like 
a real alliance. On the other hand, Germany's prestige had re- 
ceived a severe blow, and this caused her hatred of Great Britain, 
which had taken the side of France in the international convention, 
to become more intense and bitter. 

771. Some Factors of the Balkan Problem. — Our attention is 
now directed to southeastern Europe, where was laid the train 
which was to start the frightful conflagration of the World War. 
The situation here at the opening of the twentieth century was 
bewildering in the variety of the motives, interests, and aspirations 
of the peoples and governments concerned, but it will become in a 
measure intelligible if we bear in mind the following dominant facts : 
First, the situation was one which concerned the relations to 
Turkey of the several small Balkan states. The Turkish provinces 
adjoining these little states contained more than two million Chris- 
tian Greeks, Bulgarians, and Serbians who longed for liberation 
from Ottoman oppression and for union with their emancipated 
brethren. Racial and religious antagonisms among the Christians 
themselves, especially in Macedonia, aggravated the disorder and 
wretchedness. 

Second, the situation was one which concerned more or less 
closely several of the great powers. Russia's old ambition to con- 
trol the waterways leading from the Black Sea to the ^gean was 
not only still active but was now more urgent than ever before, 
because her defeat by Japan had denied her a warm-water port on 
the Pacific. Great Britain no longer barred her way, but Germany 
was now interested in keeping these waterways out of her hands, 
since the Muscovite seated on the Bosporus would imperil German 
interests in Asia Minor and defeat the great German project of a 
Berlin-to- Bagdad Railway. 
"^ Then the ambition of the Slav state of Serbia to unite all the 
people of Serbian race in a Greater Serbia, with outlets on the 
Adriatic and the ^gean, was a menace to the integrity of Austria- 
Hungary, for the neighboring provinces of the monarchy were 



xii THE WORLD WAR 

largely Serbian in blood, in language, and in sympathies and would 
inevitably gravitate towards an enlarged and prosperous Serbia. 
In a word, Serbia was just such a present danger to Austria in the 
Balkans as Sardinia had been to her possessions in Northern Italy 
in the nineteenth century/^ Just as Sardinia drew to herself the 
Italian subjects of Austria, so now Serbia threatened to draw to 
herself all the Serbian subjects of Austria-Hungary. Thus a 
Greater Serbia threatened the dismemberment of the Austro- 
Hungarian Monarchy. Moreover, the establishment of a powerful 
Serbian state meant that Austria's coveted way to the ^gean 
would be barred ; for after Austria's expulsion from Northern 
Italy, which had been for centuries the pathway of her Mediterra- 
nean trade, she had turned towards the East and had sought to 
secure an outlet across Macedonia to Saloniki on the ^gean. 

Besides the several interests of Russia, Germany, and Austria- 
Hungary in the Balkan problem, still another of the great powers, 
Italy, was deeply concerned. Italy desired possession of Italia 
irredenta^ "unredeemed Italy," which embraced lands on her 
northern Alpine frontier and about the head of the Adriatic, of 
which the population was largely Italian, but which were held by 
Austria just as once she held Lombardy and Venetia. Further- 
more, Italy was watchful to see that, with the Turks driven out of 
Europe, Austria should not appropriate Albania as her part of the 
booty and thus get possession of the eastern shore of the Adriatic 
and make of that sea an Austrian lake. 

These mutual jealousies, rival ambitions, and conflicting interests 
of the great powers created the Balkan problem in so far as it 
was an international question concerning Europe at large. 

772. The Young Turks ; the Turkish Revolution (1908). — The 
situation in the Balkans being such as is portrayed in the preced- 
ing section, a remarkable movement in the Turkish Empire became 
the prelude to events of world import. In 1908 a revolution in- 
augurated by a party calling themselves Young Turks broke out 
in European Turkey. The leaders of this movement were men 
many of whom had been educated in Western Europe and had 
16 Cf. sees. 690-696. 



THE YOUNG TURKS xiii 

there become imbued with the spirit of modern liberalism. Gain- 
ing control of the Balkan army, they demanded and secured from 
the Sultan Abdul Hamid a constitution^^ which created a parlia- 
ment and gave to all the subjects of the Sultan equal civic rights 
and complete religious liberty. The news of the granting of a con- 
stitution was received by the subjects of the Sultan first with utter 
incredulity, and then, when the news was confirmed, with unparal- 
leled demonstrations of joy. The world looked on with amazed and 
sympathetic interest. To the first Turkish parliament which con- 
vened under the constitution the American Congress sent good 
wishes and congratulations, while the leading members of the 
British House of Commons sent an address headed, " From the 
Oldest of Parliaments to the Youngest." 

For a few years the Young Turks administered affairs with 
such a measure of success as to awaken high hopes everywhere 
that the regeneration of Turkey was now really to be effected and 
the eternal Eastern Question thus given a final solution. But un- 
fortunately there was a lack of capable leaders in the party of 
reform. The promise of equal rights to all was not kept. The 
Young Turks could not give up their position as the dominant 
and privileged race of the empire. They set about the forcible 
" Turkification " of all the non-Turkish peoples — the Greeks, the 
Armenians, the Albanians, the Bulgarians, and the Arabs — of 
the Ottoman dominions. Meanwhile the treacherous Abdul Hamid 
broke faith with the revolutionists and worked secretly to get rid 
of the constitution and to regain his despotic power. ^^ 

773. The Bosnian Crisis (1908). — But an even more serious 
obstacle in the way of the success of the reform movement than 
these internal weaknesses and dissensions was the sordid greed of 
several of the great powers, who saw in a regenerated Turkey the 
ruin of all their hopes of ultimately inheriting coveted portions of 
the "sick man's " estate. His recovery was the very last thing 

1'' This was a revival of a constitution that had been granted in 1876 and later 
revoked. 

18 Abdul Hamid, after having instituted atrocious massacres of the Christians at 
Adana and other places in Asian Turkey, was deposed in 1909 and his brother 
Mohammed V placed on the throne. In 1918 he was succeeded by Mohammed VI. 



Xiv THE WORLD WAR 

they desired. Austria, fearing that if the Young Turks suc- 
ceeded in establishing a reformed and strong government she 
would lose control of Bosnia and Herzegovina, of which Turkish 
provinces she had been made administrator by the Treaty of 
Berlin, annexed the provinces to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy 
(1908). This was a gross violation of the terms of the Berlin 
treaty and the direct beginning of the great tragedy of 19 14. 

Serbia, which had hoped that the provinces, their population being 
largely Serbian in race and language, would fall to her on the pass- 
ing of the " sick man," felt grievously injured by Austria's act, and 
made vigorous protest, but unavailingly ; for when Russia and 
Great Britain also protested. Emperor William took his stand, 
in " shining armor," ^^ by the side of Austria and upheld her in her 
wrongful procedure. Neither Russia nor any other of the great 
powers being ready to risk precipitating a general European war 
through intervention by force of arms, the provinces remained in 
Austria's hands. Another great crisis had been passed, but not 
without Europe's being drawn nearer to the abyss. By a gesture 
of the " mailed fist " Emperor William had settled to his own and 
his ally's advantage a matter of European concern. But there was 
danger in settling matters of that kind in such a manner. 

774. The Second Moroccan Crisis (19 n). — We have seen how 
at the time of the first Moroccan crisis France was commissioned 
by the powers to preserve order in the country. Unfortunately 
the native government was inefficient and corrupt, hence the 
inevitable happened. The country fell into anarchy. A French 
army was soon at the capital Fez, and one of the rival contest- 
ants for the crown placed himself under French protection. This 
meant, of course, that Morocco's existence as an independent 
state was ended.^ 

At once a German warship, the Panther, appeared at one of 
the country's ports,^^ and the German Emperor asked France what 
compensation she would allow Germany in return for a free hand 

19 A phrase used by the Kaiser in a later speech. 

20 The country became a French protectorate in 1912. 

21 Agadir, 191 1. 



THE BALKAN WARS XV 

in Morocco. After long and heated " conversations " — Great 
Britain with her navy ready for action supporting France, since 
she could not permit Germany to secure a foothold on the shore 
opposite Gibraltar — the Emperor consented to the establishment 
by France of a protectorate over Morocco in return for the cession 
to Germany of portions of the French possessions in tropical Africa. 

Thus by threat of v^ar Germany had secured a " place in the 
sun" in Africa, but her relations with France had been greatly 
embittered, for the French denounced her action as blackmail, 
holding that German interests in Morocco were not of a nature to 
justify the intervention of Germany in the matter. 

Furthermore, the relations of Germany and Great Britain had 
been rendered still more tense, for many Germans were dissatis- 
fied with the settlement and felt that had it not been for the sup- 
port which the British government gave France, Germany might 
have secured larger concessions from her — perhaps have got a 
part of Morocco itself. 

775. The Balkan Wars (19 12-19 13). — ^^^ example set by 
Austria in 1908 in the seizure of the Turkish provinces of Bosnia 
and Herzegovina was shortly followed by Italy.^^ A regenerated 
Turkey threatened to make an end of the long-cherished hope of 
the Italians that Tripoli and Cyrenaica in North Africa woilld fall 
to them as ripened fruit on the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. 
So the Italian government resolved to seize at once the coveted 
prize, justifying this action on the ground that the Young Turks 
were treating unfairly Italian settlers and traders in the country. 
An expedition was launched, and the provinces were seized and 
annexed to Italy (19 11). 

The Austrian and Italian attacks upon the integrity of the Otto- 
man Empire naturally excited the small Balkan states and helped 
to bring them to an epoch-making decision. Bulgaria, Serbia, 
Montenegro, and Greece formed an alliance (the Balkan League), 

22 Other states had earlier followed her example. Two days after Austria had 
announced her decision to annex Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria proclaimed her 
complete independence from the suzerainty of the Ottoman Porte. Straightway the 
island of Crete, still under nominal Turkish suzerainty, declared for union with Greece 
(1908). Crete's union with Greece was sanctioned by the Treaty of London, 1913. 



XVI THE WORLD WAR 

the aim of which was to make an end of the Turkish power in 
Europe. The adventure turned out beyond all expectation. To 
the amazement of the world the armies of the little states in a few 
weeks drove the Turks from almost all their possessions on the 
European continent — thus accomplishing what the great powers, 
because of their mutual jealousies, had been unable in centuries 
of war and diplomacy to effect. 

The marvelous success of the allies put into their hands much 
greater spoils in the way of territory than they had expected, and 
all probably would have gone well in the distribution of these had 
it not been for the intervention of the great powers, the interests 
of more than one of which were menaced by .the proposed settle- 
ment. Austria, supported by Italy, demanded that no part of 
Albania should be allowed to go to Serbia, but that this territory 
should be made into an independent state. This was to keep 
Serbia from the Adriatic. Thus pushed back from her coveted 
outlet on these waters, Serbia turned towards the ^gean. She 
asked Bulgaria to consent to a revision of the original agreement 
regarding the division of the lands wrested from the Turks, and 
permit her to retain possession of a part of Macedonia. Bulgaria 
refused and insisted upon a division of the conquered lands in 
accordance with the terms of the original agreement. The Tsar 
of Russia in vain begged the disputants to submit the matter to 
him as arbiter. Instead of doing this Bulgaria suddenly attacked 
Serbia, being incited to this act,- there is reason to believe, by 
Austria, and thus precipitated the Second Balkan War. In this 
lamentable struggle Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, and Rumania 
were united against Bulgaria. The Turks seized the opportunity 
to retake a portion of the territory wrested from them in the first 
war. Beset on every side, Bulgaria was soon forced to give over 
the struggle. By the Treaty of Bucharest there was made a new 
map of the Balkans. All that we need note here is the territorial 
aggrandizement of Slavic Serbia. This meant, of course, the 
enhancement of Russian influence in the Balkans, since racial 
sentiment and sympathies would naturally cause Serbia to draw 
towards the great mother Slav state. 



ASSASSINATION OF CROWN PRINCE OF AUSTRIA xvii 

On the other hand, a Greater Serbia was a menace to Austria, 
for a powerful Serbia would not only block her way to the ^gean 
but would naturally draw away or make more restless Austria's 
subjects of Serbian race, thereby tending to hasten the dis- 
integration of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. 

Furthermore, an enlarged and powerful Serbia under Russian 
influence and protection was something that the German Emperor 
could not brook, since it lay across the Berlin-to-Bagdad Railway 
and was a menace to that project and thus to the whole Pan- 
German scheme for the commercial and political domination of 
Western Asia. 

776. Assassination of the Crown Prince of Austria ; Austria's 

Ultimatum to Serbia It was inevitable that, in the circumstances 

which we have described, Austro-Serbian relations should become 
strained to a dangerous tension. Events moved rapidly. While 
visiting the recently annexed province of Bosnia, the Austrian 
crown prince — the Archduke Francis Ferdinand — and his wife 
were assassinated.^^ Austria, charging that Serbian officials were 
accomplices of the assassins, addressed to Serbia an ultimatum,^ 
some of the demands of which were incompatible with the rights 
of Serbia as a sovereign and independent state. An answer was 
demanded in forty-eight hours. Serbia returned a conciliatory 
reply, acceding to most of the demands and offering to submit 
either to the International Tribunal at the Hague or to the judg- 
ment of certain of the great powers the points to which she could 
not give unqualified assent. The reply was pronounced unaccept- 
able, and Austria, supported in her course by Germany, declared 
war against Serbia. ^^ 

The action of Austria created alarm in every European capital. 
Strenuous efforts were made by Great Britain, France, and Russia 
to stay Austria's hand and to have the whole question brought 
before a conference of the great powers not directly interested or 
carried to the Hague Tribunal, for nothing was more certain than 
that an attack by Austria upon Serbia would precipitate a general 
European war, because Russia would not and could not stand 
23 At Sarajevo, June 28, 1914. 24 juIy 23, 1914. 25 July 28. 



xviii THE WORLD WAR 

aloof and see the little Serbian nation crushed, since this would 
mean German supremacy in the Balkans. But Germany, rejecting 
all proposals, insisted that the matter concerned Austria and 
Serbia alone and that there should be no intervention by any of 
the other powers. 

Austria having actually attacked Serbia, Russia began to mobi- 
lize her armies against the Dual Monarchy. Germany thereupon 
sent an ultimatum to Russia demanding that she demobilize within 
twelve hours. Russia giving no response, Germany declared war 
against her.^^ 

At the same time Germany asked the French Premier, Viviani, 
whether in the event of a Russo-German war France would remain 
neutral. His reply was that " France would take such action as 
her interests might require." Almost immediately the German 
troops crossed the French frontier.^^ On August 2 Germany pre- 
sented an ultimatum to Belgium, declaring it to be her purpose to 
march across Belgian territory to attack France and promising, if 
the passage of the German troops was not opposed, to guarantee, 
upon the conclusion of peace, the independence and integrity of 
the Belgian kingdom, but at the same time warning the Belgian 
government that if the advance of the German forces was impeded 
in any way, the German government would deal with Belgium 
as an enemy. The Belgian government, reminding Germany that 
she herself had solemnly promised to respect Belgian neutrality, 
refused to consent to the passage of the German army, saying that 
" by accepting the proposal she would sacrifice the honor of the 
Belgian nation while at the same time betraying her duties towards 
Europe." The German troops at once swept into Belgium. 

The violation of Belgium brought Great Britain into the war.^^ 
On August 4 the British ambassador at Berlin received instruc- 
tions to inform the Imperial German Government that if assurance 

26 August I. 

27 Germany declared war on France Aug. 3. 

28 Though the invasion of Belgium by the Germans actually brought Great 
Britain into the war, it is certain that she would, as the ally of France, have taken 
part in it even if the neutrality of Belgium had not been violated. She could not 
liave stood aside while Germany was striking down France, robbing her of her 
colonies, and making of her a vassal state. 



THE VIOLATION OF BELGIUM xix 

was not given by twelve o'clock that night that the German 
advance into Belgium would be stopped, the British government 
would "take all steps in their power to uphold the neutrality 
of Belgium and the observance of a treaty to which Germany 
was as much a party as themselves." The German Chancellor, 
Bethmann-Hollweg, greatly agitated, expressed pain and surprise 
that the British government should take such a resolve "just for 
a word, ' neutrality ' — just for a scrap of paper." 

The Imperial German Government's reply to the British ulti- 
matum being that it was absolutely necessary that the German 
armies should advance into France " by the quickest and easiest 
way, so as to be able to get well ahead with their operations 
arid endeavor to strike some decisive blow as early as possible," 
Great Britain at once drew the sword. 

Thus by August 5, only fourteen days after Austria's ultimatum 
to Serbia, five of the great powers were at war. The curtain had 
lifted on " the most tragic drama of human history." 

II. Outstanding Events of the War 

777. The Violation of Belgium. — The German plan of cam- 
paign was simple. With a swift blow France was to be struck 
down before her allies could come to her aid ; then Russia, whom 
Austria was to hold in check while the German armies were over- 
running France, was. to be put out of the war. But the French 
frontier toward Germany, running from Switzerland to Luxemburg, 
was strongly fortified, and the reduction of these defenses would 
delay for at least several weeks the advance into France of the 
German troops; hence the proposal made by Germany to the 
Belgian government for an unobstructed passage of the German 
armies through Belgium. We have seen how, upon the indig- 
nant rejection of this dishonorable proposal, the German troops 
were flung across the frontier in utter disregard of treaty obliga- 
tions and of international law. The crime was confessed in self- 
indicting words by the German Chancellor, Bethmann-Hollweg. In 
announcing to the Reichstag the invasion of Belgium, he said: 



XX THE WORLD WAR 

" Gentlemen, we are now in a state of necessity, and necessity 
knows no law. Our troops have occupied Luxemburg and per- 
haps are already on Belgian soil. Gentlemen, that is contrary 
to the dictates of international law. ... The wrong — I speak 
openly — that we are committing we will endeavor to make good 
as soon as our military goal has been reached." ^ 

The first obstacle to the advance of the German forces was the 
strongly fortified city of Liege. In a few days the defenses of the 
place, which had been thought impregnable, were pounded into 
dust by the monstrous siege guns of the enemy. 

The resistance of the Belgians roused a fury of rage in the 
Germans, who now began a campaign of " frightfulness " {Schreck- 
Hchkeit), the purpose of which was to terrorize the people and make 
them submissive to the German will. Villages and cities, individual 
citizens of which it was alleged had fired upon the German sol- 
diers, were sacked and burned, and hundreds of non-combatants — 
men, women, and children — were indiscriminately slain. Hos- 
tages were shot for the alleged acts of persons over whom they 
had no control. Priests were killed. The famous university and 
library of Louvain were wantonly destroyed and a large part of 
the city itself laid in ashes. The world stood aghast at these 
crimes, for it had been believed that the time was past when 
the armies of any civilized government would commit such atroc- 
ities, to which there is no parallel in history since the Thirty 
Years' War. 

The brave resistance of the Belgians to the passage of the 
German armies had momentous consequences. The delay, short 
though it was, that it caused the Germans not only gave the 
French time to concentrate their forces and throw them to the 
north between the invaders and Paris but it also gave England 
time to come to the aid of her ally with a small but efficient force. 
It thus made possible the great victory of the Mame. 

778. "The Miracle of the Mame" (Sept. 5-9, 1914)- — Along 
the Franco-Belgian frontier the German invaders were met by 
the French and British armies. Their stubborn resistance to the 

29 This speech was made Aug. 4, 1914. 



"THE MIRACLE OF THE MARNE " xxi 

German advance, however, was broken, and the victorious Germans 
pushed on towards Paris. The French government fled to Bor- 
deaux. It seemed as though the story of 1870 was to be repeated. 
But with the enemy almost within sight of the capital, the French 
general, Joffre, halted the retreat of his forces along the southern 
banks of the river Marne, and there, near the region where, more 
than fourteen hundred years before, the hordes of Attila were 
turned back by the Franks and their allies,^ inflicted a memorable 
defeat upon the invaders. The Germans retreated to the river 
Aisne, nearly halfway to the Belgian frontier, and there intrenched 
themselves. 

The battle of the Marne is rightly given a place — perhaps it 
should be the first place — among the decisive battles of the world. 
It saved not only France but all continental Europe from German 
domination, for nothing is more certain than that, if France had 
lost at the Marne, Russia would have been quickly overrun by 
the German armies and German military and political control of 
the Continent firmly established. 

779. The Struggle for the Channel Ports The Germans had 

failed in their plans to reach Paris and put France out of the war. 
They now made a supreme effort to reach the sea and get control 
of the Channel ports on the shore opposite England. With these 
ports in the hands of the enemy the safety of England would, of 
course, have been imperiled. Strenuous efforts were made to 
prevent such a calamity. British, French, and Belgian forces 
were quickly thrown between the Germans and the coveted prize. 
These land forces were aided by the British fleet, which patrolled 
the coast. In the Flanders region the sluices were opened and 
wide tracts of the land flooded — an old device for defense in 
these low-lying lands. The struggle was long and bitter. Some of 
the bloodiest battles of the war were fought here.^^ The British 
army, " a contemptible little army," as it was characterized by the 
German kaiser, after deeds of valor which made of the epithet of 

30 See Ancient History^ 2d Rev. ed., sec. 544. 

31 The most important were the battle of the Iser and the battle of Ypres. 
(" '■ Wipers ' of the English Tommy deserves a place beside Waterloo and Blenheim 
in English history." — Simonds) 



xxii THE WORLD WAR 

scorn a badge of immortal honor,^^ was virtually annihilated. 
Though the Germans reached the sea at Ostend and gained con- 
trol of a strip of the Belgian coast, they were thwarted in reach- 
ing their main objective — the ports of Calais and Boulogne, at 
the narrowest part of the Channel. 

780. The Western Battle Front After the battle of the Mame 

and at the end of the struggle for the Channel ports, the Germans, 
still standing in the main on French and Belgian soil, intrenched 
themselves along a line about four hundred and seventy miles in 
length, running from Switzerland to the North Sea. Facing the 
German trenches were drawn the trenches of the Allies. Never 
before in history was there such a far-flung battle line. Between 
the opposing lines of ditches, dugouts, and wire entanglements ran 
a strip of ground varying in width from a few yards in some places 
to several hundred yards in others, known as " No Man's Land " — 
a name which suggests much of the tragedy of the great war. 

For about a year and a half the French, aided by a small num- 
ber of British and Belgian troops, held back the German masses 
along this extended line, while a new British army, numbering sev- 
eral millions, was being raised, trained, and equipped; and then 
for another like period the Anglo-French-Belgian forces manned 
the trenches until the United States, which early in 19 17 had 
entered the war, was mustering, drilling, and transporting to 
France a vast army. 

During these three years the fighting along this Western front 
was in the nature of siege operations. Hundreds of cannon, large 
and small, were constantly pouring showers of shell into the 
trenches of the enemy, until in many places " No Man's Land " 
was so plowed up and so pitted with shell holes that a pho- 
tograph of it from an airplane resembled a photograph of the 
crater-pitted face of the moon. Many offensives, or drives, were 
launched by both the Germans and the Allies in efforts to push 
back or break through the opposing line, but at the end of the 
three years the lines, though in some places they had been bent 

32 The survivors of this expeditionary army proudly accept the title of " The 
Contemptibles." 



THE EASTERN FRONT xxiii 

and pushed towards Germany, in general ran substantially as at 
the beginning of the period. 

The story of this trench warfare on the Western front belongs 
to the military records of the war and cannot be dwelt upon here 
We shall merely, a little later, preserving the chronological order 
of our narrative, speak briefly of one of the offensives undertaken 
by the Germans and mention others launched by the Allies, 
which were such supreme efforts as to make them of epochal 
importance. ^^ 

781. The Eastern Front; Russian Victories and Reverses 
(1914-1915). — We must now turn our attention to the Eastern 
front. Just at the moment when the Germans were threatening 
Paris, the Russians came to the aid of their French ally by sending 
two armies into East Prussia and menacing Berlin, One of the in- 
vading armies was met and almost annihilated by the German gen- 
eral, Hindenburg.^* The other army then drew back to the frontier. 

This defeat of the Russians in East Prussia was offset by their 
victories over Austria in Galicia.^^ Three great Austrian armies 
were routed and three hundred thousand prisoners taken. The 
military power of Austria seemed on the point of absolute col- 
lapse. But with the coming of Germany to the rescue of her ally, 
the tide was quickly turned. A great victory for the Central Powers ^^ 
saved Austria and crippled seriously the military power of Russia. 
A wide strip of Western Russia, including Poland, fell into the 
hands of the Germans. As earlier in the west so now here in the 
east there resulted a deadlock, and the contending armies settled 
down to trench warfare. 

Thus Germany at the end of campaigns covering about a year 
and a half had failed as to her main purpose both in the west and 
in the east.^^ Neither France nor Russia, though each had received 
a terrible blow and lost much territory, had been put out of the war. 

33 See sec. 785 and n. 45. 

34 At the battle of Tannenberg, Aug. 31, 1914. 

35 Lemberg was taken by the Russians about September i, 1914; Przemysl fell 
into their hands in early March, 191 5, with 125,000 prisoners. 

36 The battle of the Dunajec, early May, 1915, as decisive a victory for Germany 
^s the battle of the Mame was for France. 

37 She was more successful in the southeast (see sec. 784). 



XXIV THE WORLD WAR 

782. The Sinking of the Lusitania (May 7, 19 15). — On 
February 4, 19 15, the German government announced that every 
merchant vessel of the Allies entering a designated zone around 
the British Isles would be destroyed, " without its being always 
possible to avert the dangers threatening the crews and passengers." 
This meant that such vessels would be sunk without warning. 

Now, to do the thing the German government announced it was 
going to do would be not only to violate the principles of humanity 
but to disregard the law of nations, which forbids the destruction 
of passenger or merchant ships under any circumstances before 
the crews and passengers have been put in a place of safety. 

Notwithstanding a solemn warning from President Wilson that 
the United States government would hold the German government 
to a " strict accountability " if such action as it purposed to take 
should result in the death of any American citizens, the German 
submarines straightway proceeded to sink merchant vessels 
without warning, and in several instances destroyed the lives 
of American citizens. Then on May i, 19 15, there appeared in 
American newspapers an advertisement issued by the German 
Embassy in Washington, in which all persons were warned against 
taking passage on the British steamship Lusitania, which was 
about to sail from New York for an English port, it being inti- 
mated that every effort would be made by German submarines 
to sink the liner. No attention was paid to the warning, as no 
one believed that any government would do the thing that the 
Imperial German Government threatened to do. 

On the evening of May 7, 19 15, as the Lusitania, with crew 
and passengers numbering about two thousand, neared the 
Irish coast, she was torpedoed without warning, and more than a 
thousand persons, among them many women and little children, 
were -drowned. 

This awful crime created horror and indignation throughout the 
civilized world. The United States government demanded of the 
German government a disavowal of the act and assurance that 
the operations of its submarines would in the future conform to 
the requirements of international law. But it was only after a long 



ITALY ENTERS THE WAR xxv 

delay and the exchange of numerous notes that the German gov- 
ernment finally gave the following pledge : " Liners will not be 
sunk by our submarines without warning and without providing 
for the safety of the lives of non-combatants, provided that the 
liners do not try to escape or offer resistance." ^^ 

It was the breaking of this solemn pledge by the Imperial 
German Government thatj as we shall learn, was the immediate 
cause of the United States, early in 19 17, entering the war on the 
side of the Allies. 

783. Italy enters the War (May 23, 19 15). ^-Although a 
member of the Triple Alliance, Italy did not join Germany and 
Austria in the war, because she was convinced that the war 
against Serbia was an act of aggression on the part of Austria, 
and since the alliance of which she was a member was merely a 
defensive, and not an offensive, alliance, she was not bound to 
come to the aid of her allies. 

In truth Italy's alliance with Austria was an altogether unnatural 
one, for Austria was the hereditary enemy of the Italian people.^ 
Instead of fighting for the extension of Austrian rule and the en- 
hancement of Austria's influence and power in the Balkans, the 
Italians were rather minded to take advantage of her embarrass- 
ment and fight for the liberation of the still unredeemed Italian 
lands ^° {Italia irredenta). Negotiations were begun by the Italian 
government with Austria for her withdrawal from these districts. 
But no agreement could be reached, and Italy entered the war on 
the side of the Allies. A new battle front was thus created. For 
the next two years and more this front was the scene of much 
hard mountain fighting, in which the Italian armies wrested from 
Austrian control much of the coveted lands.*^ Then came a great 
disaster, of which we shall speak later, and the loss by the Italians 
of all that had been gained, and much besides. 

38 This pledge was given Sept. i, 1915. "A liner now means any vessel which 
sails for any commercial purpose with reasonable regularity and as a part of 
recognized commerce. Thus we speak of transatlantic liners and coastwise liners ; 
of passenger liners and freight liners.*' — Beck, The War and Huma?tity (2d ed., 
J917), p. 182. 39 See Chapter XXXIX. 40 The Trentino and Trieste. 

41 Embracing the important city of Gorizia, which was taken Aug. 8, 19 16. 



xxvi THE WORLD WAR 

784. The War in the Southeast in 19 15 ; Serbia and Turkey 

We have noted how the close of the year 19 15 saw Germany's 
main war aims both in the west and in the east unattained 
(sec. 781). In the southeast, however, by the end of the year 
Germany had completely realized her plans. What she wanted 
here was to secure Austro-German supremacy in the Balkans and 
to keep unobstructed her railway route to the Persian Gulf. All 
this she achieved in a terrible drive against Serbia and through 
aiding Turkey in the defense of the Dardanelles. 

The Serbian situation at the beginning of this offensive was 
as follows: At the opening of the war in 19 14 Austria had in- 
vaded Serbia and taken the capital, Belgrade. After severe fighting 
the Serbians had retaken their capital and driven the Austrians 
from Serbian soil. Germany then came to the aid of her ally, and a 
strong Austro-German army in cooperation with a large Bulgarian 
force — Bulgaria having joined the Central Powers — quickly over- 
came all Serbian resistance.*^ The Serbian army, in one of the 
most distressful retreats in history, fled southward over the Alba- 
nian mountains, amidst the snows of a bitter winter, and the 
remnant who escaped capture or death from exposure found a 
refuge in the island of Corfu. Serbia was made a second Belgium. 
Montenegro, which fought with Serbia, was involved in Serbia's 
ruin. 

There were still other misfortunes to deepen the gloom that 
darkened for the Allies the close of the year 19 15. An attempt 
made early in the year by an Anglo-French fleet to reach Constan- 
tinople by forcing the -Dardanelles *^ had ended in disaster. This 
failure of the fleet was followed by an equally ill-fated land attack,** 
in which Australian and New Zealand troops won special distinc- 
tion. Before the end of the year the allied forces, having suffered 
great privation and heavy losses, were withdrawn. 

42 An Anglo-French army which had been gathered at the Greek port of Saloniki 
was outmatched and, hampered by the fear of Greek treachery in its rear, was unable 
to render the Serbians any effective aid. 

43 Turkey had entered the war in November, 19 14, on the side of the Central 
Powers. Her action was motived, in part, by fear of her hereditary enemy, Russia, in 
the event of the triumph of the Allies. ^ On the peninsula of Gallipoll 



VERDUN — " THEY SHALL NOT PASS " xxvii 

Thus "for the moment Germany had realized the German 
dream of expansion to the Near East, the conception of a Central 
Empire, a Mittel-Europa, fronting the Baltic and the Adriatic, over- 
flowing the Sea of Marmora into Asia Minor, and bound by the 
German-built railway uniting Berlin, Vienna, and Constantinople 
with Bagdad, and Hamburg and Antwerp with Suez and the 
Persian Gulf. Here at last was a solid gain, a real victory, after 
two great disappointments " (Simonds). 

785 . Verdun — ' * They shall not pass. ' ' — The event of greatest 
military importance in 19 16, the third year of the war, was the 
German offensive — really a trench battle that lasted nearly a year 
— against Verdun, on the west front. Russia having been defeated 
and the German situation in the Balkans made secure, Germany 
now turned to strike another blow at France in the hope of break- 
ing either the French line or the French spirit and thus putting 
France out of the war before Great Britain's new army was drilled, 
equipped, and in the field. 

The blow was aimed at Verdun, an ancient French fortress. 
The attack began early in the year. The grim watchword of the 
French was, " They shall not pass." The Germans, after the first 
rush, made for several months only slow foot-by-foot advances; 
and then the French, taking the offensive, quickly drove them 
from practically all the ground which they had occupied. The 
losses of the Germans in killed, wounded, and prisoners are esti- 
mated to have exceeded a quarter of a million. This French victory 
was second only to that of the Marne.^^ 

45 At the same time that the Germans launched their great offensive at Verdun 
the Austrians made a menacing attack through the Trentino. To reUeve the pressure 
on their allies, Russia and Great Britain started offensives. Russia, having recovered 
more quickly than was thought possible from her defeat in 1915, attacked Austria 
and took 400,000 prisoners. This forced the Austrians hastily to withdraw their 
troops from Italy for the defense of their eastern frontier. In Asia Minor the Grand 
Duke Nicholas, commander of the Russian forces in the Caucasus, set on foot a 
campaign against the Turks, overran Armenia, and captured the important cities of 
Erzerum and Trebizond. 

The British, or rather Franco-British, drive is known as the battle of the Somme. 
This was one of the great battles of the war. The enemy's lines were so shaken that 
in the spring of 191 7 the Germans were forced to retreat to what is known as the 
Hindenburg line. The territory given up was wantonly and ruthlessly devastated. 



xxviii THE WORLD WAR 

786. Rumania enters the War and is ruined. — Before the end 
of the year 19 16 the fortunes of the Central Powers were at their 
lowest ebb. The German attempt to break the French front at 
Verdun had failed ; the British and French had gained the great 
victory of the Somme ; *^ Italy had repelled the Austrian invasion 
of the Trentino and had made important gains in the region 
between the Julian Alps and the sea. It seemed as though the 
ultimate defeat of the two empires was certain. At this critical 
moment Rumania entered the war,*^ making the seventh nation 
arrayed against the Central Powers. Her aim in throwing herself 
into the struggle was to realize national unity for the Rumanian 
race by the liberation from the Austro-Hungarian yoke of the 
several million Rumanians of Transylvania. 

Rumania's action simply added another to the many tragedies 
of the great war. Betrayed by pro-German sympathizers among 
Russian officials, the little state was quickly crushed by the German 
armies and the greater part of its territory occupied.*^ 

787. A German Peace Offer; President Wilson's Address to the 
Senate (Jan. 22, 19 17). — The overshadowing events of the year 
19 1 7 were the Russian revolution, with its aftermath of the col- 
lapse of Russia, and the entrance into the war of the United States 
of America. But before proceeding to speak of these matters we 
must note certain discussions respecting terms of peace and the 
war aims of the belligerents which marked the close of the year 
19 1 6 and the opening of the year upon which we here enter. 

These peace discussions were opened by the Central Powers. 
Adopting the tone of victors, they proposed a meeting for peace 
negotiations of all the nations at war. The Allies refused to enter 
into such a conference until Germany and Austria had stated the 
conditions upon which they were ready to conclude peace. 

About the same time President Wilson, acting independently of 
the overtures of the Central Powers, asked all the nations at war 
to state "their respective views as to the terms upon which the 
war might be concluded, and the arrangements which would be 

46 See note 45. '^~ Aug. 27, 1916. 

48 The campaign was not completed until 19 17. 



A GERMAN PEACE OFFER xxix 

deemed satisfactory as a guarantee against its renewal or the 
kindling of any similar conflict in the future." 

To this appeal the Central Powers made only a very brief reply, 
which contained no statement as to the terms on which they would 
be willing to conclude peace. The allied governments, however, 
replying at greater length, stated concretely the objects they sought 
in -the war, declaring these to be "the restoration of Belgium, of 
Serbia, of Montenegro, and the indemnities which are due them ; 
the evacuation of the invaded territories of France, of Russia, and 
of Rumania, with just reparation; ... the restitution of prov- 
inces or territories wrested in the past from the Allies by force or 
against the will of their populations, the liberation of Italians, of 
Slavs, of Rumanians, of Czechs, and of Slovaks from foreign dom- 
ination ; the enfranchisement of populations subject to the bloody 
tyranny of the Turks; . . . and the liberation of Europe from 
the brutal covetousness of Prussian militarism." 

Then on January 22, 19 17, President Wilson, in an historic 
address to the Senate, set forth the principles that must form the 
basis of any peace which would have any prospect of permanency, 
and which the United States would be ready to join other nations 
in guaranteeing. Among the principles and the conditions of 
peace were these: (i) "The principle that governments derive 
all their just powers from the consent of the governed, and that 
no right anywhere exists to hand peoples about from sovereignty 
to sovereignty as if they were property." 

(2) " That no nation should seek to extend its policy over any 
other nation or people, but that every people should be left free 
to determine its own policy, its own way of development, unhin- 
dered, unthreatened, unafraid, the little along with the great and 
powerful." 

(3) Limitation of war navies, of armies, and of all naval and 
military preparations for war ; and a league of the civilized nations 
of the world to guarantee peace and the rights of all nations.'*® 

This setting forth by the Allies and President Wilson of what 
should be the terms and principles of a just and permanent peace 
49 This passage is slightly condensed. 



XXX THE WORLD WAR 

was at the same time a disclosure of the real issues involved in the 
great war, and thus a revelation of the deeper causes of the 
unparalleled conflict; for in the terms of settlement of a war, if 
the settlement be a just, adequate, and final settlement, are dis- 
closed the real causes of the struggle that it brings to a conclusion.^" 

Dwelling upon the suggestion of a league of nations for main- 
taining the peace of the world. President Wilson said impressively: 
" It is inconceivable that the people of the United States should 
play no part in that great enterprise. They cannot, in honor, with- 
hold the service to which they are now about to be challenged. . . . 
That service is nothing less than this — to add their authority and 
their power to the authority and force of other nations to guarantee 
peace and justice throughout the world." 

President Wilson at this time apparently believed that the people 
of the United States would be called upon only to take part, after 
the war, in the formation of a union or federation of the nations to 
maintain the future peace of the world and to preserve the liberties 
of all nations, great and small. But it was a vastly greater and more 
self-sacrificing service to which they were soon to be challenged. 

788. The German Government announces its Purpose to resume 
Unrestricted Submarine Operations (Jan. 31, 19 17). — We have 
noted the submarine controversy between the United States and 
Germany (sec. 782). The pledge given the United States by the 
German government not to torpedo liners without first caring for 
the safety of crew and passengers was only partially kept for about 
a year and a half. Then Germany gave notice to the United States 
that it would immediately " do away with the restrictions which 
until now it has impressed upon its use of its fighting means at 
sea." This meant that all ships, those of neutrals as well as those 
of the enemy, entering designated areas in the Mediterranean or a 
zone drawn around the British Isles, would be sunk on sight and 
without regard to the safety of the persons they carried.^^ 



50 Cf. sees. 761 and 762. 

51 Permission was given to the United States to send one passenger liner a week 
to Great Britain, provided that it was marked in a certain way with stripes, departed 
on a specified day, and made the port of Falmouth in England its destination. 



THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION xxxi 

The answer of the United States government to this amazjing 
announcement was to hand the German ambassador, Bernstorff, 
his passports.^^ This meant the severance of all diplomatic rela- 
tions with the Imperial German Government. In an address of 
great dignity and earnestness President Wilson informed the Con- 
gress of the step he had taken. The address was in effect a warning 
to the German government not to do the thing it had threatened to do. 

789. The Russian Revolution (March 16, 1917). — While the 
United States, on the verge of war, was awaiting events, the atten- 
tion of the world was arrested by one of the most remarkable 
revolutions in history. On March 16, 191 7, Tsar Nicholas II, 
the reigning representative of the House of Romanov, which had 
ruled despotically in Russia for over three hundred years, was 
forced to abdicate, and a provisional government was set up.^^ 
Amnesty was granted for all political and religious offenses. Tens 
of thousands of exiles in Siberia and in the prison fortresses of 
Russia were set free. Liberty of speech and of the press was pro- 
claimed. All restrictions of a social, religious, and racial character 
were abolished. Universal suffrage was decreed. A constituent 
assembly was to be called to draft a constitution. The news of the 
revolution was received by liberals everywhere with unbounded 
enthusiasm. The United States straightway recognized the new 
government and welcomed Russia as a member of the family 
of free nations. The British Premier, David Lloyd George, in a 
message of congratulation said of the revolution : "It reveals the 
fundamental truth that this war is at bottom a struggle for popular 
government and liberty. It shows that through the war the princi- 
ple of liberty, which is the only sure safeguard of peace in the 
world, has already won one resounding victory. It is a sure promise 
that the Prussian military autocracy, which began the war and which 
is still the only barrier to peace, will before long be overthrown." 

52 Feb. 3, 1917. 

53 The immediate cause of the revolution, aside from the widespread suifering of 
the people and general war-weariness, was the incompetence shown by the govern- 
ment in the conduct of the war, and the popular belief, which was well founded, that 
the defeats v/hich the Russian armies had suffered were the result of treachery on 
the part of Russian officials of pro-German sympathies. 



xxxii THE WORLD WAR 

Unfortunately the draught of liberty was too strong. The 
Russian people, suddenly freed from autocratic tyranny, were 
intoxicated. They were in a state of bewilderment. Hundreds of 
German agents crossed the frontier and incited sedition, disorder, 
and treason. The provisional government made heroic but un- 
availing efforts to hold back the country from anarchy. The army 
fell into a state of disorder and confusion. Of this collapse of 
Russia and her practical elimination as a military factor from the 
war we shall speak later. 

790. The United States enters the War (April 6, 19 17). — On 
the second day of April, 19 17, President Wilson addressed both 
Houses of Congress, called in extraordinary session, on the results 
of the unrestricted operations of the German submarines resumed 
two months before.^ " The new policy," he said, " has swept 
every restriction aside — vessels of every kind, whatever their 
flag, their character, their cargo, their destination, their errand, have 
been ruthlessly sent to the bottom without warning and without 
thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels of friendly 
neutrals along with those of belligerents. Even hospital ships and 
ships carrying relief to the sorely .bereaved and sorely stricken 
people of Belgium . . . have been sunk with the satne reckless lack 
of compassion or of principle. . . . The present German submarine 
warfare against commerce is a warfare against mankind." 

The President then advised the Congress that it " declare the 
recent course of the Imperial German Government to be in fact 
nothing less than war against the government and people of the 
United States [and] that it formally accept the status of belligerent 
which has thus been thrust upon it." 

" We are glad," he continued, " to fight for the ultimate peace of 
the world and for the liberation of its people, the German people 
included; for the rights of nations, great and small, and the 
privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life and of 
obedience. The world must be made safe for democracy." 

The Congress and the country were profoundly moved. Four 
days later, on the sixth of April, the House of Representatives by an 

54 See sec. 788. 



THE UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR xxxiii 

overwhelming vote accepted a joint resolution, which had already 
been passed by the Senate, and which declared that a state of 
war existed between the Imperial German Government and the 
government and the people of the United States. Thus was 
the momentous decision made, and the great American republic, 
without excitement but with grave determination and with a good 
conscience, entered the World War. 

To the allied countries the action of the United States was a 
heartening affirmation of the righteousness of their cause and a 
sure guarantee of ultimate victory. On receipt of the news in 
England the Stars and Stripes were flung out alongside the Union 
Jack of Great Britain from the high tower of the Parliament 
Building at Westminster — "the first tim.e," it is said, "that a 
foreign flag was ever displayed from that eminence." 

A few weeks later the first troops of an expeditionary force 
from the United States, under General Pershing, landed in France.^^ 
They were received by the war-worn French people with frantic 
demonstrations of joy and gratitude. After marching through the 
streets of Paris the soldiers made a pilgrimage to Lafayette's grave. 
Arriving at the tomb, General Pershing saluted and spoke these 
words : Lafayette, nous voila f (" Lafayette, here we are 1 ") 

791. Other Events of the Year 19 17. After the decision of the 
United States government, in early April, to accept the status of 
a belligerent forced upon it by the acts of the German government, 
the remaining months of the year 19 17 were spent by it in prepa- 
rations for actual" participation in the war. Ten million men be- 
tween twenty-one and thirty-one years of age were registered, from 
which by selective draft a great army in successive installments of 
half a million or more was to be created, equipped, and drilled. 
Sixteen cantonments, each a veritable city capable of accommo- 
dating about forty thousand soldiers, were constructed and made 
ready for the new recruits by early autumn. To meet the cost of 
these preparations and the expense of building a great mercantile 
fleet of hundreds of vessels to replace those destroyed by the 
German submarines, and of constructing thousands of airships, as 

55 June 26. 



xxxiv THE WORLD WAR 

well as to provide for great loans to our allies, Congress voted 
sums of money reckoned by billions. These enormous amounts 
were raised by increased taxation and by the sale of bonds. 

In Europe the summer and fall months of the year witnessed 
military operations on all the battle fronts. In the west there was 
practically continuous trench warfare, but the lines of neither 
side were broken through, and the year ended without any military 
decision on this front having been reached. 

In the east the Russian collapse became complete by midsum- 
mer. The army simply fell to pieces. Libert}^ had been proclaimed, 
,and to the simple peasant soldiers that meant that every one was 
free to do as he liked. Thousands left the trenches and returned 
to their homes. The empire disintegrated like the army. Finland, 
the Ukraine, and other districts or nationalities severed all relations 
with Petrograd and set up as independent republics. 

Taking advantage of the Russian situation, the Germans seized 
the important Baltic port of Riga.^^ The provisional government 
established at Petrograd was overthrown, and the reins of power 
passed into the hands of the extreme socialists (Bolsheviki), who 
instituted a regime similar in some respects to that of the extrem- 
ists of the French Revolution. The leaders of this counter- 
revolution, Lenine and Trotzky, now opened peace negotiations 
with the Central Powers. ^^ The principles they proclaimed 
were " no annexations, no indemnities, and self-determination 
of peoples." The year ended with these negotiations still in 
progress. 

The Russian collapse had serious results for the Italians. It 
allowed the Central Powers to transfer considerable forces from 
the eastern to the Italian front. A great offensive against the 
Italians resulted in the breaking of the Italian lines, which neces- 
sitated a retreat to the Piave River and the abandonment of all 
the ground that the Italian armies, under the able General Cadorna, 
had gained in two years of arduous mountain campaigning. A 
part of Venetia also was lost by the Italians.^ 

56 Aug. 3, 191 7. 57 In December, at Brest-Litovsk, 

58 October and November, 1917. 



OTHER EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1917 xxxv 

In Asian Turkey the British forces made important advances 
during the year. In the early spring they captured the city of 
Bagdad, on the Tigris River,^^ and thus gained control of lower 
Mesopotamia. Towards the end of the year they wrested from 
the Turks the city of Jerusalem. The Holy Gity was thus restored 
to the Christian world after having been in the hands of the 
Moslems since its capture by the Saracens in the year 637, 
excepting the short period in the twelfth century when it was 
held by the crusaders. 

On the sea the German ruthless warfare against the merchant 
ships of the world was the matter of chief importance. Hundreds 
of ships of the Allies and of neutrals alike were sunk and 
thousands of lives of non-combatants destroyed. But this law- 
less method of warfare resulted in much greater injury to Ger- 
many than to her foes. It turned virtually the whole civilized 
world against her. 

Towards the close of the year Brazil declared war against 
Germany, making the nineteenth in the list of states taking such 
action.^'' Eleven others had, by the end of the year, broken off 
relations with her.^^ These thirty states embrace more than four 
fifths of the world's population. 

792. Events of the Year 1918. — Before entering into the peace 
conference with Russia, mentioned in the preceding section, 
Germany had agreed to adhere to the general principles of 
" no annexations, no indemnities, and the self-determination of 
peoples." These principles she wholly disregarded as soon 

59 March 11, 1917. An earlier attempt to take the city had ended in failure and 
the capture of the entire British army of 10,000 men at Kut-el-Amara (April 28, 1916). 

€0 The names of these states and the date of the entry of each into the war are 
here given: Serbia, July 28, 1914 ; Russia, Aug. i, 1914; France, Aug. 3, 1914; 
Belgium, Aug. 4, T914 ; Great Britain, Aug. 4, 1914 ; Montenegro, Aug. 7, 1914 ; 
Japan, Aug. 23, 1914; Italy, May 23, 1915 ; San Marino, June 2, 1915 ; Portugal, 
March 10, 1916; Rumania, Aug. 27, 1916 ; United States, April 6, 1917 ; Cuba, April 
8,1917; Panama, April 9, 19 1 7; Greece, July 16, 1917 ; Siam, July 22, 1917 ; Liberia, 
Aug. 7, 1917; China, Aug. 14, 1917; Brazil, Oct. 26, 1917. 

61 Bolivia broke off relations April 14, 1917; Guatemala, April 27, 1917; Hondu- 
ras, May 18, 1917; Nicaragua, May 19, 1917 ; Santo Domingo, June 8, 1917; Haiti, 
June 17, 1917; Chile, June 29, 1917; Costa Rica, Sept. 21, 1917; Peru, Oct. 6, 
1917; Uruguay, Oct. 7, 19175 Ecuador, Dec. 8, 1917. 



xxxvi THE WORLD WAR 

as Russia was in her power. The states which came into 
existence through the break-up of the Russian Empire — Ukrania, 
Poland, Lithuania, and Finland — were treated as dependent and 
vassal states of the Central Powers. 

With the pressure on the eastern front removed by the collapse 
of Russia, the German government, in flagrant violation of its 
plighted word, straightway transferred large bodies of troops from 
Russia to the western front, in the hope of gaining a military 
decision there before the United States could come with effective 
force to the help of her allies. With their armies in France thus 
strengthened, the Germans, late in March, launched their long- 
expected drive for Paris and the Channel ports. At the same 
time they began the bombardment of Paris with a monstrous 
long-range cannon, which was located seventy-five miles from 
the capital. A few days later a bomb from the huge gun fell 
upon a Paris church, where a large congregation was gathered 
at a Good Friday service, killing seventy-five persons and 
wounding ninety others. Under the terrific onset of the German 
armies, numbering probably over one million, the Franco- British 
lines were bent back with heavy losses, but were not broken. 
The situation was most critical. All the American soldiers in 
France, under General Pershing, were offered to Marshal Foch, 
the commander-in-chief of the Allies, to be used as he should 
"deem best. At the same time urgent appeal was made to the 
United States government to hurry to France all the reenforce- 
mefits possible. In response to this call the shipping of troops 
across the sea was hastened. A steady flow of about a quarter 
of a million men each month was maintained until the close of 
the war, when the United States had in France a great army 
of over two millions. 

Throughout the spring and early summer months the Germans 
renewed their offensive at intervals and made further gains. But 
by the middle of July the drive had spent its force. The American 
army had by this time been so greatly augmented that the superi- 
ority in numbers was now on the side of the Allies. The tide of 
battle turned. A great counter-offensive was launched. The 



EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1918 xxxvii 

Germans were hurled back across the Marne. The so-called 
Hindenburg line, a system of strong defenses, was broken, and 
the German armies began a general retreat from France towards 
the Belgian frontier. 

With the tide of battle on the western front thus running 
against the Germans, disaster was befalling their allies on other 
fronts. In Palestine the British forces under General Allenby, on 
the historic field of Armageddon, almost annihilated the Ottoman 
armies. The important cities of Damascus and Beirut fell into 
the hands of the British (October 2-9). At about the same time, 
on the Macedonian front, the Franco-Serbian forces inflicted upon 
the Bulgarian armies a defeat which, before the end of September, 
forced Bulgaria to^ sue for peace. This was granted on terms 
which meant a complete military surrender. 

The withdrawal of Bulgaria from the war, along with the 
reverses in Syria and the critical situation on the western front, 
caused Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey simultaneously 
to ask through President Wilson for a general armistice "on 
land and water and in the air" (October 5). The armistice 
was to be the forerunner of peace negotiations based on fourteen 
propositions which President Wilson had formulated and explained 
in various addresses (see sec. 787). 

After an exchange of notes between President Wilson and the 
Central Powers, the matter was given over into the hands of the 
Supreme War Council of the Allies in France. Events now 
moved rapidly. Before the end of the month Turkey, hopelessly 
defeated, signed an armistice which amounted to unconditional 
surrender (October 30), and four days later Austria-Hungary, 
with her armies in Italy routed and the monarchy rapidly dis- 
solving into its various racial elements, sought and obtained an 
armistice on like conditions. At the same time the terms on 
which Germany might be granted a cessation of hostilities were 
formulated by the War Council of the Allies at Versailles, and 
the German government was informed that Marshal Foch would 
receive accredited representatives and communicate to them the 
conditions of an armistice. On Friday, November 8, a German 



xxxviii THE WORLD WAR 

delegation reached the headquarters of Marshal Foch and were 
handed the armistice terms for acceptance or rejection by eleven 
o'clock on the following Monday. A few hours before the expira- 
tion of the time limit, the armistice, which was to run for thirty-six 
days, was signed by the German envoys. Among its thirty-four 
conditions were these: (i) immediate evacuation by the German 
armies, without harm to persons or destruction of property, of 
all invaded countries, and withdrawal across the Rhine to a line 
about six miles from the right, or east, bank of that river ; (2) the 
surrender of all submarines and certain other ships of the German 
navy; (3) renunciation of the treaties of Bucharest and Brest- 
Litovsk ; and (4) the immediate repatriation of allied prisoners 
and deported civilians, the restitution of property wrongfully 
taken from invaded countries, and reparation for damage done. 

These conditions were in effect equal to full and unconditional 
surrender, and were such as to make it impossible for Germany, 
at the expiration of the truce period, to renew hostilities. Hence 
the signing of the armistice may be regarded as marking the 
end of the great war. The Allied armies, with Marshal Foch 
as Generalissimo of all the forces, had inflicted the most com- 
prehensive and thorough defeat in history, and amid universal 
rejoicing and celebration had brought to an end the greatest and 
most horrible w^ar in the history of the world. 

Shortly before the signing of the armistice Emperor William, 
his mad dream of world dominion shattered, sought an asylum 
in Holland, leaving Germany not the dictator of a Germanized 
world, as he had fondly hoped, but the scene of turmoil, revolu- 
tion, and threatened anarchy. . 



EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1918 xxxix 

References. — Roland G. Usher, Pan-Germanisin. Andre Chera- 
DAME, The Pan-German Plot Unmasked. Friedrich von Bernhardi, 
Germany and the Next War. Morris Jastrow, The War and the Bagdad 
Railway. Prince von Bulow, Imperial Germany. James W. Gerard, 
My Four Years in Germany. Herbert Adams Gibbons, The Neiv Map 
of Europe. James M. Beck, The Evidence in the Case. Jacques Marquis 
D.e Dampierre, German Imperialism and International law. Ellery C. 
Stowell, The Diplomacy of the War of igi4. James Brown Scott, 
A Survey of Internatiojtal Relations between the United States aitd Genjiauy, 
igi4-igi'j. Henry van Dyke, Fighting for Peace. D. Thomas Curtin, 
The land of Deepening Shadow. Carl W. Ackerman, Germany., the A^ext 
Republic. The two following works are published anonymously : Out of 
Their Own Mouths (utterances of German rulers, statesmen, and party 
leaders) and I Accuse ! (J'Accuse!), by a German. Catalogue numbers 
I, 4, 5, 6 of Series No. i of the War Information Booklets, issued by the 
Committee on Public Information, Washington, D.C. The text of the 
different documents (the " British White Paper," the " German White 
Book," the " French Yellow Book," etc.) of the belligerent governments 
bearing on the outbreak of the war will be found in convenient form in 
the pamphlets issued by the American Association for International 
Conciliation, 407 West 117th St., New York City. 



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